THE  LIBRARY 

OF 

THE  UNIVERSITY 

OF  CALIFORNIA 

LOS  ANGELES 


1831-1906 


University  of  Alabama 

BULLETIN 


COMMEMORATION 
NUMBER 


CONTAINING  the  PROGRAMS  AND  ADDRESSES  OF  THE 

CELEBRATION  of  the  SEVENTY-FIFTH  ANNIVERSARY 

OF  THE  OPENING  OF  THE  UNIVERSITY 

MAY  27,  28,  29,  30,   1906 


PUBLISHED  BY  THE  UNIVERSITY 
NOVEMBER,  1906 


NOTE. 


At  a  meeting  of  the  Society  of  the  Alumni  of  the  Univer- 
sity of  Alabama  on  May  31,  1904,  Mr.  Walter  Dudley  Seed, 
Mr.  James  Jefferson  Mayfield,  and  Mr.  Frank  Sims  Moody 
were  appointed  a  committee  "to  co-operate  with  the  Faculty 
and  Trustees  in  arranging  plans  for  the  special  celebration 
of  the  Seventy-Fifth  Anniversary"   in   1906. 

On  May  29th,  1905,  the  following  were  appointed  as  a  cen- 
tral committee  to  arrange  the  details  of  the  celebration : 

Mr.  Walter  Dudley  Seed,  to  represent  the  Society  of  the 
Alumni ; 

Hon.  Henry  Bacon  Foster,  to  represent  the  Board  of  Trus- 
tees ; 

Professor  Thomas  Waverly  Palmer,  to  represent  the  Fac- 
ulty of  the  University. 

At  the  request  of  this  committee,  Dr.  John  William  Aber- 
crombie,  President  of  the  University,  and  Mr.  William  Plill 
Ferguson,  President  of  the  Society  of  the  Alumni,  acted  as 
ex-officio  members. 

The  establishment  of  the  University  occurred  December 
18th,  1820,  by  act  of  the  General  Assembly.  The  formal 
opening,  however,  took  place  April  12th,  1831,  with  the  in- 
auguration of  the  Reverend  Alva  Woods,  D.  D.,  as  the  first 
president.  It  was  decided  to  place  the  commemoration  exer- 
cises at  the  time  of  the  regular  annual  commencement  in  May, 
1906. 


-77. 7 


HISTORICAL   STATEMENT. 

The  University  of  Alabama  is  an  institution  maintained  by 
the  State  of  Alabama  for  the  collegiate  and  professional  educa- 
tion of  its  youth.  It  was  called  into  existence  by  the  generosity 
of  the  Congress  of  the  United  States,  and  fostered  by  the 
founders  of  the  state. 

The  Constitutional  Convention,  which  met  at  Huntsville, 
Alabama  Territory,  on  July  5th,  1819,  adopted  the  following 
article : 

"Schools  and  the  means  of  education,  shall  forever  be  en- 
couraged in  this  state.  *  *  *  The  General  Assembly  shall 
take  like  measures  for  the  improvement  of  such  lands  as  have 
been  or  may  be  hereafter  granted  by  the  United  States  to  this 
state  for  the  support  of  a  seminary  of  learning,  and  the  moneys 
which  may  be  raised  from  such  lands  by  rent,  lease,  or  sale,  or 
from  any  other  quarter,  for  the  purpose  aforesaid,  shall  be 
and  remain  a  fund  for  the  exclusive  support  of  a  State  Univer- 
sity, for  the  promotion  of  the  arts,  literature,  and  the  sciences ; 
and  it  shall  be  the  duty  of  the  General  Assembly,  as  early  as 
may  be,  to  provide  effectual  means  for  the  improvement  and 
permanent  security  of  the  funds  and  endowments  of  such  in- 
stitution." 

In  1819,  the  Congress  of  the  United  States  donated  seventy- 
two  sections,  or  46,080  acres,  of  land  within  the  state  for  the 
endowment  of  a  seminary  of  learning.  At  the  second  session 
of  the  General  Assembly,  an  act  was  passed,  December  18th, 
1820,  establishing  a  seminary  of  learning  "to  be  denominated 
the  University  of  Alabama." 

"At  the  third  session  of  the  General  Asseml)ly,  on  the  13th 
day  of  December,  1821,  an  act  was  passed  providing  that  'His 
Excellency,  the  Governor,  ex-ofUcio,  together  with  twelve  trus- 
tees, two  from  each  judicial  circuit,  to  be  selected  by  joint  bal- 
lot of  both  houses  of  the  General  Assembly,  to  continue  in  of- 
fice for  the  term  of  three  years,'  should  constitute  a  body  politic 
and  corporate  in  deed  and  in  law,  by  the  name  of  'The  Trus- 
tees of  the  University  of  Alabama,'  and  that  the  Governor 
should  be  cx-officio  president  of  the  board."  The  first  meeting 
of  the  Board  of  Trustees  was  held  at  the  town  of  Tuscaloosa  on 


4  University  Bulletin. 

the  6th  of  April,  1823.  On  the  2yth  of  December,  1827,  the 
General  Assembly,  by  joint  ballot  of  both  houses,  selected  Tus- 
caloosa as  the  seat  of  the  University.  The  site  whereon  to 
erect  the  buildings,  one  mile  and  a  quarter  east  of  the  court 
house  in  Tuscaloosa,  was  selected  by  the  Trustees  on  the  22nd 
of  March,  1828. 

The  Reverend  Alva  Woods,  D.  D.,  was  publicly  inaugurated 
as  president  of  the  University  on  April  I2th,  183 1,  in  Christ 
Church,  in  the  city  of  Tuscaloosa.  Six  days  later  the  Uni- 
versity was  opened  for  the  admission  of  students,  fifty-two 
students  matriculating  the  first  day. 

On  the  4th  of  April,  1865,  a  body  of  Federal  cavalry,  who 
had  been  dispatched  for  the  purpose,  set  fire  to  all  the  publ'c 
buildings  of  the  University,  except  the  astronomical  observa- 
tory, which  were  completely  destroyed.  The  erection  of  new 
buildings  was  begun  in  January,  1867,  and  collegiate  instruc- 
tion was  resumed  in  April,  1869. 

Through  the  efforts  of  the  Honorable  John  T.  Morgan, 
United  States  Senator  for  Alabama,  a  second  donation  of  pub- 
lic lands,  within  the  state,  to  the  extent  of  seventy-two  sec- 
tions, or  46,080  acres,  was  made  to  the  University  by  the  Con- 
gress of  the  United  States  by  the  Act  of  February  23rd,  1884, 
in  restitution  of  the  loss  in  buildings,  library,  and  scientific 
apparatus  incurred  in  1865. 

With  the  exception  of  the  interruption  of  its  activity  from 
1865  to  1869,  the  University  has  annually  carried  on  its  special 
work  since  its  organization. 


tlie  (;liumui,  anil  tlie  Silaauatma  y.mk^ 

of  tlie 

muiiie'i(^itif  cl  vllaiiama 

mmit  ijou  to  (S^e  kukut  at  tne  cekkaiiou 

d  tae 

d  tae  okeuiua  oj  tne  Tlluwe^i^itu 

(If tail  tireutij=ki;eutfi  to  tWtetft 

mueteeu  nimcl'iea  ana  kx 

Loot^a,   uiatiama 


^^—^ ^'M( 


GENERAL  PROGRAM. 


The    following   programs    were   observed,    with   the   minor 
exceptions  noted  in  the  record  of  the  addresses : 

SUNDAY,  MAY  37. 

11    A.    M. 

Celebration  Sermon  (Clark  Hall)  : 

W.  H.  P.  Faunce,  D.  D.,  President  Brown  University, 

Providence,  Rhode  Island. 

MONDAY,  MAY  23. 
9:45  A.  M. 
Academic  Procession  (Campus  Avenue). 
10:00  A.  M. 

Addresses  of  Welcome  (Clark  Hall)  : 

For  the  University — John  W.  Abercrombie,  Presi- 
dent. 

For  the  State  Department  of  Education — Isaac  W. 
Hill,  Superintendent. 

For  the  State  of  Alabama — Wm.  D.  Jelks,  Governor. 

11    A.    M. 

Responses     by     Representatives     of     other     Institutions 

(Clark  Hall)  : 

For  the  North  Atlantic  States — J.  H.  Penniman,  Ph. 
D.,  Dean  Academic  Faculty,  University  of  Penn- 
sylvania. 

For  the  South  Atlantic  States— Charles  W.  Kent,  Ph. 
D.,  Professor  English,  University  of  Virginia. 

For  the  South  Central  States^-Brown  Ayers,  Ph.  D., 
LL.  D.,  President  University  of  Tennessee. 


University  Bulletin.  7 

For  the  North  Central  States — Edmund  J.  James,  Ph. 

D.,  LL.  D.,  President  University  of  Illinois. 
For  the  Western  States— Thomas  W.  Page,  Ph.  D., 

Professor    History    and    Economics,    University 

of  California. 
For  Sister  State  Institutions— C.  C.  Thach,  LL.  D., 

President  Alabama  Polytechnic  Institute. 
For  the  Press  of  Alabama — Gen.  Rufus  N.  Rhodes, 

Editor  Birmingham  Daily  News. 

3-4  P.  M. 
Inspection  of  Library,  Museum,  and  Laboratories. 

4-6  p.  M. 
Baseball  Game,  Sewanee  vs.  Alabama.     (Campus.) 

8-11  p.  M. 
President's  Reception    (President's  Mansion). 

TUESDAY,   MAY   29. 

9-11    A.     M. 

Business  Meeting  Society  of  the  Alumni  (Clark  Hall.) 

11  A.   M. 

Oration  to  Society  of  Alumni  (Clark  Hall)  : 

Charles  A.  Towne,  Member  of  Congress  from  Four- 
teenth District  of  New  York. 

1:00  p.  M. 
Alumni  Banquet  (Woods  Hall). 

4:00  p.  M. 
Baseball  Game,  Sewanee  vs.  Alabama.     (Campus). 


University  Bulletin. 

8-10  p.  M. 

Alumni  Debate  (Clark  Hall)  :  Subject— Resolved.That 
the  Old  Times  were  Better  than  the  New.  Affirma- 
tive—Charles E.  McCall,  1885,  and  W.  C.  Richard- 
son, 1843,  for  the  Erosophic.  Negative — Russell  P. 
Coleman,  1902,  and  Chappell  Cory,  1878,  for  the 
Philomathic. 

10:00  p.  M. 

Class  Reunions  (Places  to  be  announced.) 

WEDNESDAY,    MAY   30. 

9:00  A.  M. 

Annual  Meeting  Board  of  Trustees  (Garland  Hall). 

10:00  A.  M. 

Orations  by  Selected  Members  of  the  Senior  Class  (Clark 
Hall). 

11    A.    M. 

Celebration  Oration :  Francis  P.  Venable,  Ph.  D.,  LL. 
D.,  President  University  of  North  Carolina. 

12:00   M. 

Conferring  of  Degrees  by  the  President  of  the  University. 

4:00  p.  M. 
Baseball  Game,  Team  of  1893  vs.  Varsity  (Campus). 

9:00  p.  M. 
University  Reception  (Woods  Hall.) 


BACCALAUREATE  SUNDAY. 

Holy,    Holy,    Holy!    Lord   God    Almighty! 
Early  in  the  morning  our  song  shall  rise  to  Thee; 
Holy,  Holy,  Holy!  Merciful  and  Mighty! 
God  in  three  Persons,  blessed  Trinity! 

Holy,  Holy,  Holy!  all  the  saints  adore  Thee, 
Casting  down  their  golden  crowns  around  the  glassy  sea; 
Cherubim  and  Seraphim  falling  down  before  Thee; 
Which  wert  and  art,  and  ever-more  shall  be. 

Holy,  Holy,  Holy!    Lord   God  Almighty! 

All  thy  works  shall  praise  Thy  name  in  earth, 

and  sky,  and  sea; 
Holy,  Holy,  Holy!   Merciful  and  Mighty! 
God  in  three  Persons,  blessed  Trinity! 

Invocation. 

Rev.  Lemuel  Orah  Dawson,  D.  D. 
Pastor  Baptist  Church,  Tuscaloosa. 

Shout  the  Glad  Tiding-s Was^ner-Baumbach 


Come,  thou  almighty  King, 
Help  us  tny  name  to  sing. 

Help  us  to  praise! 
Father  all  glorious, 
O'er  all  victorious, 
Come  and  reign  over  us. 

Ancient  of  days. 

Come,  thou  incarnate  Word, 
Gird  on  thy  mighty  sword. 

Our  prayer  attend; 
Come,  and  thy  people  bless, 
And  give  thy  word  success; 
Spirit  of  holiness. 

On  us  descend. 


Come,  holy  Comforter, 
Thy  sacred  witness  bear 

In  this  glad  hour. 
Thou  Vv'ho  almighty  art, 
New  rule  in  every  heart. 
And  ne'er  from  us  depart. 

Spirit  of  power! 

To  the  great  One  and  Three 
Eternal  praises  be 

Hence — evermore ! 
His  sovereign  majesty 
May  we  in  glory  see, 
And  to  eternity 

Love  and  adore. 


10  University  Bulletin. 

Reading  of  the  Scriptures. 

Largo Handel. 

Mr.  John  Caiman. 

A  Song  of  Great  Joy /.  Lewis  Browne. 

Mr.  Hill  Ferguson. 

Celebration  Sermon. 

Rev.  W.  H.  P.  Faunce,  D.  D. 

President  Brown  University,  Providence,  Rhode  Island. 

Text :  Isaiah  54  :2 — "Lengthen  thy  cords  and  Strengthen  thy 

stakes." 

Prayer. 

Hallelujah  Chorus Handel 


Come,  Thou  Fount  of  every  blessing, 

Tune  my  heart  to  sing  Thy  grace, 
Streams  of  mercy,  never  ceasing. 

Call  for  songs  of  loudest  praise. 
Teach  me  some  melodious  sonnet, 

Sung  by  flaming  tongues  above; 
Praise  the  mount — I'm  fixed  upon  it! 

Mount  of  Thy  redeeming  love. 

Here  I'll  raise  my  Ebenezer, 

Hither  by  Thy  help  I'll  come; 
And  I  hope,  by  Thy  good  pleasure. 

Safely  to  arrive  at  home. 
Jesus  sought  me  when  a  stranger, 

Wand'ring  from  the  fold  of  God; 
He,  to  rescue  me  from  danger, 

Interposed  his  precious  blood. 

Oh,  to  grace  how  great  a  debtor 

Daily  I'm  constrained  to  be! 
Let  thy  goodness,  like  a  fetter. 

Bind  my  wand'ring  heart  to  Thee. 
Prone  to  wander,  Lord,  I  feel  it — 

Prone  to  leave  the  God  I  love — 
Here's  my  heart,  O  take  and  seal  it. 

Seal  it  for  Thy  courts  above. 


Benediction. 


Opi'Ning  of  the  Celebration. 


By  President  John  William  Abercromhie. 


Ladies  and  Gentlemen : 

In  the  selection  of  commencement  preachers,  it  has  been 
our  custom  to  choose  from  the  protestant  denominations  rep- 
resented by  the  church  organizations  at  Tuscaloosa,  taking 
them  in  rotation.  Under  that  custom,  the  selection  for  this 
year  falls  to  the  Baptist  Church,  and  the  Trustees  and  Facul- 
ties of  the  University  consider  themselves  fortunate  in  hav- 
ing secured  from  Dr.  William  Herbert  Perry  Faunce  an  ac- 
ceptance of  the  invitation  to  deliver  the  commencement,  or 
celebration  sermon. 

As  is  well  known  to  many  of  you,  Dr.  Faunce  is,  and  has 
been  for  a  number  of  years,  the  able  and  distinguished  presi- 
dent of  Brown  University,  at  Providence,  R.  I.  Before  going 
to  the  presidency  of  that  University,  he  was  for  fifteen  years 
engaged  in  the  work  of  the  ministry,  the  last  ten  as  pastor  of 
the  Fifth  Avenue  Baptist  Church  of  New  York  City. 

All  institutions  of  learning  are  connected  by  a  bond  of 
interest,  because  all  are  striving  for  the  same  object,  namely, 
the  establishment  of  truth,  the  dissemination  of  knowledge, 
the  inculcation  of  patriotism,  and  the  promotion  of  true  re- 
ligion. In  addition  to  the  usual  ties  that  bind  such  institutions, 
the  University  of  Alabama  and  Brown  University  are  bound 
by  one  of  sentiment.  The  first  president  of  the  University, 
Rev.  Alva  Woods,  D.  D.,  was  a  professor  in  that  University 
before  coming  to  Alabama.  It  is  highly  fitting,  therefore, 
from  every  standpoint,  that  Brown  University  should  lend 
us  her  president  on  this  occasion. 

Dr.  Faunce  is  a  recognized  leader  in  the  educational  and 
religious  life  of  the  nation,  and  I  am  sure  that  you  will  hear 
him  with  pleasure  and  profit.  He  will  now  preach  the  cele- 
bration sermon. 


12  University  Bulletin. 

Celebration  Sermon.  * 


By  President  VVilliam  Herbert  Perry  Faimce, 
Brozvn  University. 


Isaiah  54:2 — "Lengthen  thy  cords,  strengthen  thy  stakes." 

The  process  of  lengthening-  and  the  process  of  strengthening 
are  so  different  as  to  appear  sometimes  in  hopeless  antagon- 
ism. The  duty  of  continually  broadening  out  our  life,  of  tak- 
ing in  new  intellectual  territory,  of  enlarging  the  bounds  of 
knowledge  and  experience  is  very  clear;  but  no  less  clear 
is  the  necessity  of  driving  in  deeper  those  great  primary  con- 
victions which  alone  give  our  life  stability  and  power.  Here 
is  the  two-fold  need  of  every  man,  every  church,  every  nation 
— breadth  of  apprehension  and  intensity  of  conviction. 

We  all  know  the  men  of  intense  conviction  only.  We  call 
them  the  men  of  one  idea.  They  see  only  one  thing,  but  they 
see  it  so  vividly  and  intensely  that  the  vision  instantly  passes 
into  action.  Their  very  limitations  give  them  a  certain  swift- 
ness and  energy.  As  some  one  has  said:  "We  put  blinders 
on  horses  precisely  because  we  don't  want  them  to  take  broad 
views  of  things,  but  to  go  straight  forward." 

Then  we  all  know  the  men  of  breadth  only — sometimes  so 
broad  that  they  are  vague  and  hesitant  and  helpless.  They 
are  hospitable  to  all  ideas,  dominated  by  none ;  playing  with  all 
creeds,  not  coming  under  the  power  of  any.  They  have  no 
capacity  for  leadership,  but  seem  to  move  about  in  the  fog. 
God  sometimes  has  to  choose  the  narrow  men,  because  the 
broad  men  have  become  inert  and  insipid. 

So  certain  periods  in  the  world's  story  seem  periods  of  in- 
tense conviction  only.  We  call  them  the  "ages  of  faith." 
When  Luther  threw  his  inkstand  at  the  devil,  when  the  King's 
Evil  was  cured  by  the  touch  of  the  King's  hand,  when  witches 
were  tortured  in  Massachusetts — then  indeed  was  there  tre- 
mendous reality  in  the  unseen.  Faith  was  so  strong  as  to 
brook  no  contradiction,  and  doubt  was  crime. 

But  the  age  in  which  we  live  is  very  different.  Freedom 
of  belief,  freedom  of  speech  is  our  heritage,  men  have  reacted 


*The  sermon  was  delivered  without  manuscript,  and  was  in 
part  put  in  writing  later  for  the  purpose  of  this  record. 


University  Bulletin.  13 

from  the  old  dogmas,  and  no  father  of  today  is  able  to  im- 
pose his  own  religious  philosophy  upon  his  growing  boy.  And 
there  are  those  who  say  that  our  age  has  become  so  tolerant, 
so  urbane,  as  to  be  spineless,  nerveless,  and  unfitted  for  such 
great  deeds  as  our  fathers  wrought. 

Must  we,  then,  choose  one  horn  or  the  other  of  this  dire 
dilemma?  Must  every  age  be  one  of  fierce  persecution  or  of 
moral  indifferentism  ?  Must  each  one  of  us  be  intensely  nar- 
row or  on  the  other  hand  nebulous  and  uncertain?  How  can 
we  lengthen  the  cord  of  life,  and  yet  strengthen  the  stakes? 

The  great  benefit  of  a  real  vacation  is  in  its  broadening  of 
our  sympathies.  Few  of  us  need  actual  and  complete  physi- 
cal rest  in  the  summer.  A  vacation  three  months  long  is  a 
damage  to  many  teachers  and  to  almost  all  students.  If  wc 
can  use  the  summer  for  travel,  we  are  almost  certain  to  re- 
turn with  broader  outlook.  To  rejoice  with  them  that  do  re- 
joice may  be  harder  than  to  weep  v/ith  them  that  weep.  Poor 
widow,  etc.,  easy.  But  to  enter  into  the  joy  of  the  scholar, 
as  he  digs  in  the  Roman  Forum,  or  lays  bare  the  site  of  an- 
cient Troy,  to  enter  into  the  joy  of  the  mediaeval  architects 
and  builders  as  they  upreared  their  cathedrals,  or  the  mediae- 
val warriors  as  they  went  forth  to  rescue  the  Holy  Sepul- 
chre from  the  Turks,  to  understand  the  joy  of  the  Japanese 
soldier  as  he  flings  away  his  life  for  his  ancestors  and  his 
Mikado, — that  is  to  become  more  truly  human  and  so  capable 
of  helping  humanity.  One  who  could  sympathize  with  all 
sorts  and  conditions  of  men,  would  he  not  be  a  true  Son  of 
Man? 

But  actual  physical  transportation  is  surely  not  necessary  to 
mental  advance.  There  are  travels  by  the  fireside.  A  man 
can  sit  by  his  evening  lamp,  and  through  the  book  and  pic- 
ture he  can  penetrate  Africa  with  Livingstone,  or  follow 
Nanzen  to  the  farthest  north.  The  study  of  history  is  the 
most  emancipating  of  all  studies.  It  makes  us  acquainted  with 
men  of  other  times,  other  customs,  opinions,  habits,  creeds, 
and  makes  us  see  that  God's  world  is  vastly  larger  than  our 
door  yard.  The  bible  is  the  most  liberalizing  of  all  books, 
if  for  no  other  reason  than  because  it  forces  all  those  who  read 
it  to  go  back  two  or  three  thousand  years,  to  go  out  of  Eu- 
rope into  Asia,  to  take  the  oriental  point  of  view,  and  to  come 


14  University  Bulletin. 

to  God  throuj^h  the  fii^ures  and  forms  of  speech  wrought  out 
by  apostles,  prophets,  and  martyrs,  who  ages  ago  fought  and 
sang  and  fell  on  sleep. 

Therefore,  every  Christian  is  constantly  broadening  his  in- 
telligence and  his  sympathy.  We  want  to  know  all  that  is 
true,  and  experience  all  that  is  right.  It  is  safe  to  know ! — and 
to  know  everything  that  is  knowable !  There  are  no  secret 
cupboards  in  the  universe  of  God.  There  is  no  esoteric  knowl- 
edge intended  for  the  theologians  or  the  philosophers,  while 
the  rest  of  us  must  be  content  with  things  that  it  is  safe 
to  believe.  Everything  that  is  true  is  for  every  man  of  us  to 
know.  Not,  indeed,  that  we  are  to  know  all  this  at  once. 
There  must  be  "line  upon  line,  and  precept  upon  precept." 
But  somewhere,  and  at  some  time,  all  truth  is  intended  for 
all  God's  children.  As  James  Russell  Lowell  used  to  say: 
"The  universe  of  God  is  fire-proof,  and  it  is  quite  safe  to  strike 
a  match."  The  only  remedy  for  the  dangers  that  spring  from 
little  knowledge  is  to  be  found  in  deeper  knowledge  yet. 
The  church  of  God  is  held  back  today  not  by  bad  men,  but 
by  good  men  who  have  stopped  growing.  Bad  men  cannot 
permanently  check  the  truth ;  but  good  men  whose  goodness 
has  fossilized  are  the  church's  heaviest  problem.  The  greatest 
happiness  of  an  astronomer  is  the  discovery  of  a  new  star  in 
the  sky.  He  is  so  sure  of  the  stars  already  there  that  he  does 
not  dream  they  can  be  thrown  out  of  their  orbits  by  any  fresh 
discovery.  Should  not  the  church  be  as  eager  to  get  a  glimpse 
of  some  new  truth  as  is  the  astronomer  to  come  in  sight  of 
some  new  star? 

But  I  hear  some  men  say  that,  while  this  may  be  true  in  the 
realm  of  physical  science,  yet  in  the  realm  of  religion  all 
truth  was  given  us  definitely  and  finally  by  the  apostles  two 
thousand  years  ago,  so  that  our  only  duty  is  to  accept  these 
formulas  and  hand  them  down  unchanged  to  our  descendants. 
I  can  only  answer  that  Jesus  Christ  did  not  think  so.  He 
never  compared  his  truth  to  jewels  in  a  casket,  to  be  trans- 
mitted intact,  but  rather  to  seed  that  is  to  be  bravely  planted. 
His  conception  of  religion  was  that  of  something  vital  and 
bound  to  grow.  A  professor  some  years  ago  in  one  of  our 
New  England  colleges  had  taught  anatomy  and  physiology 
for  some  forty  years,  using  most  of  the  time  a  text-book  which 
he  himself  had  prepared  at  the  beginning  of  this  period.     At 


University  Bulletin.  15 

last  both  students  and  faculty  felt  that  a  change  was  desirable, 
and  that  some  more  modern  text-book  should  be  secured.  One 
of  his  colleagues  finally  ventured  to  suggest  to  him  that  a  new 
book  was  desirable.  To  this  he  calmly  replied :  "Sir,  there  are 
no  more  bones  in  the  human  body  than  when  my  text-book 
was  written."  Truly  there  are  no  new  bones  in  the  body,  no 
new  books  in  the  Bible,  no  new  Lord  of  Life ;  but  our  under- 
standing of  the  body,  our  insight  into  the  Bible,  our  apprecia- 
tion of  the  meaning  and  purpose  of  Christ  are  changing  from 
year  to  year,  or  else  we  have  become  fossils  rather  than  Chris- 
tians. One  of  the  worst  enemies  of  the  Kingdom  is  the  man 
who  says  "Everything  in  religion  was  settled  long  ago."  Such 
a  man  has  parted  from  the  Bible.  That  "is  a  lamp  to  my  feet," 
not  a  philosophy  of  the  universe ;  a  "light  to  my  path,"  not  a 
theodicy.  It  is  to  tell  us  how  to  go  to  heaven,  not  how  the 
heavens  go.  The  Bible  cries  with  Job:  "Behold  these  are  but 
parts  of  his  ways,  and  how  little  is  known  of  him !"  and  with 
Paul:  "How  unsearchable  are  his  judgments,  and  his  ways 
past  finding  out." 

But  is  this  all?  That  we  should  become,  as  the  years  pass, 
less  narrow,  more  hospitable,  more  tolerant  than  before?  Sure- 
ly the  men  of  our  time  need  something  more  than  to  keep  open 
house  to  new  ideas,  to  welcome  all  the  vagrant  train  of  modern 
fact  and  fancy.  Our  country  profoundly  needs  a  deeper  con- 
viction than  ever  that  the  things  which  are  seen  are  not  made 
of  things  which  do  appear, — that  the  essential  faith  which 
came  to  most  of  us  in  our  childhood,  the  faith  of  the  men  who 
landed  on  Plymouth  Rock,  the  men  who  sat  in  the  Continental 
Congress,  the  faith  of  Washington  and  Lincoln  and  McKinley 
and  Roosevelt, — the  faith  in  "God  the  Father  Almighty,  and 
in  Jesus  Christ,  his  only  Son,  our  Lord" — is  the  only  faith 
which  makes  life  worth  living,  the  great  underlying  reaHty  of 
our  existence.  When  traveling  through  the  warm  lands  of 
Southern  Euroi^e.  I  have  noticed  that  the  Greeks  and  Romans 
everywhere  made  ample  provision  for  two  great  needs  of  hu- 
manity :  for  water  and  for  religion.  Whenever  the  Greeks 
founded  a  city,  they  carefully  conducted  springs  of  water  to 
the  central  squares,  and  turned  them  into  living  fountains. 
Then  close  beside  they  built  their  temples.  Wherever  the  Ro- 
mans built  their  homes,  they  built  huge  aqueducts,  some  of 
which   are   still  bringing  lini])id   water  from   the  hills   to  the 


Ifi  University  Bulletin. 

city.  Then  not  far  away  they  erected  their  place  of  worship. 
When  you  find  a  people  that  can  live  without  water,  you  will 
find  a  people  that  possibly  can  do  without  religion. 

America  greatly  needs  to  emphasize  the  ideal  and  spiritual 
ends  of  life  today.  We  may  be  losing  here,  for  we  are  grow- 
ing older,  and  cynicism  sometimes  creeps  in  with  the  years. 
That  is  a  most  pathetic  description  of  old  age  which  wc  find 
in  the  book  of  Ecclesiastes :  "They  shall  be  afraid  of  that 
which  is  high !"  Whenever  a  man  becomes  afraid  in  the  pres- 
ence of  the  things  that  are  high,  he  is  decrepit,  whether  his 
age  is  seventy  or  seventeen.  But  whoever  loves  the  high, 
believes  in  the  ideal,  and  works  for  what  men  call  the  im- 
possible, is  a  man  who  has  found  the  secret  of  immortal 
youth.  But  what  do  we  mean  by  the  ideal  or  spiritual  aim? 
We  are  almost  afraid  of  that  word  spiritual ;  it  has  become 
almost  a  sort  of  cant  term  with  many  people.  I  think  we 
really  mean  by  spiritual  the  power  to  see  within  every  object, 
event,  or  movement,  the  spirit  which  informs  it  and  gives  it 
significance.  The  materialist  sees  in  the  flag  only  a  poor 
piece  of  bunting  six  feet  by  four.  The  man  of  spiritual  per- 
ception sees  in  it  the  principles  of  his  country's  history,  the 
institutions  for  which  the  fathers  fought  and  died.  The  ma- 
terialist sees  in  the  cross  only  two  sticks  set  at  right  angles. 
The  man  of  spiritual  insight  sees  in  the  cross  the  sign  by 
which  faith  has  conquered  unbelief  from  the  first  century 
until  now. 

How  wonderful  was  the  power  of  Jesus,  thus  to  look  behind 
the  sign  to  the  thing  signified.  When  the  people  brought  him 
a  poor  i- liver  drachma,  they  thought  to  puzzle  him  by  tlieir 
problem:  "Is  it  lawful  to  give  tribute  to  Caesar  or  no?"  But, 
looking  behind  the  silver  coin,  he  answered :  "Render  to 
Caesar  the  things  which  are  Caesar's,  and  to  God  the  things 
which  are  God's," — in  one  sen.tence  separating  forever  church 
and  state.  When  the  woman  of  Samaria  put  to  him  her  favor- 
ite problem, — "Shall  we  worship  in  this  mountain  or  in  that?" 
■ — he,  looking  behind  all  the  disputes  of  Jews  and  Samaritans, 
answered:  "Neither  in  this  mountain  nor  in  that,  but  in 
spirit  and  in  truth." 

Just  in  proportion,  then,  as  we  are  men  of  spiritual  in- 
sight and  power,  the  antagonism  between  depth  and  breadth 
will  vanish  in  us  as  it  did  in  Jesus.     Just  because  Jesus  was 


University  Bulletin.  17 

so  sure  of  the  spiritual  essence  of  things,  he  could  afford  to 
be  patient  with  the  varying  manifestations  of  that  essence  in 
the  human  life.  Uncertainty  is  the  mother  of  intolerance.  The 
men  who  are  sure  of  the  central  reality  are  not  greatly  con- 
cerned over  the  various  forms  it  may  assume.  They  appre- 
ciate the  good  in  other  societies,  creeds,  and  movements,  and 
because  they  are  sure  of  God  and  duty  and  eternal  life,  they 
can  meet  with  serene  toLration,  and  even  sympathy,  the  men 
who  differ  from  them. 

One  of  the  most  interesting  things  in  our  time  is  the  fact 
that  the  people  of  spiritual  insight  are  finding  one  another 
out.  They  are  reaching  across  the  barriers  of  race  and  coun 
try  and  sect,  are  touching  hands  across  mountains  and  seas, 
and  realizing  that  they  belong  to  one  kingdom  of  God.  They 
are  becoming  aware  that  the  things  which  unite  Christians 
are  fundamental,  the  things  which  separate  them  are  transient. 
At  the  summit  of  the  Stelvio  Pass,  the  highest  road  in  Eu- 
rope, the  traveler  sees  a  slender  granite  shaft,  ten  thousand 
feet  above  the  sea.  It  is  the  meeting  place  of  Italy,  Austria, 
and  Switzerland.  In  the  plains  below  the  armies  of  those  na- 
tions have  clashed  again  and  again  in  battle;  but  at  the  sum> 
mit  of  the  pass  the  three  lands  meet,  and  under  the  quiet  sky 
all  is  peace.  Spiritual  altitude  is  spiritual  unity !  Just  in  pro- 
portion as  we  rise  in  soul  we  shall  find  that  we  are  one  in  ideal 
and  endeavor. 


CELEBRATION  DAY :  MONDAY. 

Academic  Procession. 

Music. 

Invocation. 

Professor  Edward  Franklin  Buchner,  University  of  Alabama. 

Addresses  of  Welcome. 

For  the  University, 
John  W.  Abercrombie,  President. 

For  the  State  Department  of  Education, 
Isaac  W.  Hill,  Superintendent. 

For  the  State  of  Alabama, 
William   D.   Jelks,   Governor. 

Music. 

Responses  by  Representatives  of  other  Institutions. 

For  the  North  Atlantic  States, 

J.   H.   Penniman,   Ph.   D.,   Dean  Academic   Faculty, 

University  of  Pennsylvania. 

For  the  South  Atlantic  States. 

Charles  W.  Kent,  Ph.  D.,  Professor  of  English, 

University  of  Virginia. 

Music. 

For  the  South  Central  States, 
Brown  Ayres,  Ph.  D.,  President  of  the  University  of  Tennessee. 

Music. 


University  Bulletin.  19 

For  the  Western   States, 

Thos.  W.  Page,  Ph.  D.,  Professor  of  History  and  Economics, 

University  of  California. 

For  Sister   State  Institutions, 
C.  C.  Thatch,  LL.  D.,  President  Alabama  Polytechnic  Institute. 

For  the  Press  of  Alabama, 
General  Rufus  N.  Rhodes,  Editor  Birmingham  News. 

Music. 


Address  of  Welcome:     For  the  University 


B\  President  John  William  Abercrombie. 


Ladies  and  Gentlemen : 

It  is  with  no  ordinary  pleasure  that  I  enter  upon  a  perform- 
ance of  the  duty  assigned  me  in  the  beginning  of  the  program 
for  today,  for  it  falls  to  the  lot  of  few  men  to  preside  over 
the  anniversary  exercises  of  an  institution  so  full  of  years. 

This  celebration  marks  the  close  of  three-quarters  of  a  cen- 
tury of  glorious  achievement.  Here  for  seventy-five  years, 
with  brief  interruption,  the  torch  of  learning  has  burned  bril- 
liantly. In  uplifted  hands  it  has  been  held.  Like  a  beacon  it 
has  shone. 

The  history  of  the  University  of  Alabama  is  coeval  with 
the  history  of  the  State  of  Alabama.  Indeed,  the  University's 
growth  and  the  State's  development  are  so  closely  related, 
so  completely  interwoven,  that  it  is  difficult  to  consider  them 
separately. 

The  University  was  provided  for  in  1819  by  the  act  of  Con- 
gress which  admitted  Alal)ama  into  the  Union  of  States.  By 
that  enactment  a  donation  of  seventy-two  sections  of  land  was 
made  for  the  endowment  of  a  seminary  of  learning.  In  Decem- 
ber, 1820,  the  General  Assembly  passed  an  act  establishing  a 
seminary  of  learning,  "to  be  denominated  the  L^niversity  of 
Alabama."  The  first  meeting  of  the  Board  of  Trustees  was 
held  in  April,  1822.  In  December,  1827,  Tuscaloosa,  then  the 
capital  of  the  state,  was  selected  for  the  seat  of  the  Univer- 


20  University  Bulletin. 

sity.  The  site  upon  which  to  erect  the  buildings,  the  present 
site  which  comprises  three  hundred  acres,  was  selected  in 
March,  1828. 

The  inauguration  of  the  first  President,  Rev.  Alva  Woods, 
D.  D.,  took  place  in  April,  1831.  Fifty-two  students  were 
matriculated  on  the  first  day  of  the  first  session.  Progress 
was  unhindered  till  the  mighty  conflict  of  the  sixties.  Near  the 
close  of  that  momentous  struggle,  the  material  equipment 
fell  a  victim  to  the  ravages  of  war.  In  April,  1865,  a  body 
of  Federal  cavalry,  who  had  been  dispatched  for  the  purpose, 
set  fire  to  and  destroyed  completely  all  of  the  seven  college 
buildings',  except  the  astronomical  observatory.  The  erection 
of  new  buildings  was  begun  in  January,  1867,  and  the  work 
of  instruction  was  resumed  in  April. 

In  restitution  for  this  loss  by  fire.  Congress  made,  in  1884, 
another  donation  of  lands,  equalling  the  first  grant  in  number 
of  acres.  With  the  proceeds  from  the  sale  of  a  part  of  this 
second  donation  most  of  the  present  buildings  were  erected. 

The  management  of  the  University  is  vested  in  a  Board  of 
Trustees  consisting  of  the  Governor  and  State  Superintendent 
of  Education,  ex-officio,  and  one  member  from  each  of  the 
nine  congressional  districts,  except  this  district,  which  has  two 
members.  The  Board  of  Trustees  is  a  self  perpetuating 
body,  election  to  membership  therein  being  subject  to  con- 
firmation by  the  State  Senate. 

Of  officers  of  instruction  and  government  there  are  forty- 
four.  The  academic,  engineering,  and  law  departments  are 
located  here,  while  the  departments  of  medicine  and  phar- 
macy are  at  Mobile.  The  enrollment  for  the  present  session 
is  491 ;  by  departments  it  is  as  follows :  Academic,  247 ;  en- 
gineering, 32  ;  law,  39  ;  medicine,  153  ;  pharmacy,  22.  Includ- 
ing the  Summer  School,  the  total  enrollment  for  the  year  is 
867. 

Prior  to  1895,  women  were  not  admitted.  Since  that  time 
they  have  been  admitted  to  the  academic  department  on  equal 
terms  with  men.  Fifty-two  young  women  are  enrolled  this 
year.  The  professors  report  that  they  perform  their  duties 
in  a  satisfactory  manner,  and  the  records  show  that  they  not 
infrequently  win  the  highest  honors. 

Except  the  interruption  mentioned,  the  University  has  been 
in  con*-inuous  operation  since  the  opening  in  1831.     Over  seven 


University  Bulletin.  21 

thousand  students  have  been  in  attendance,  and  over  two 
thousand  have  been  graduated. 

The  requirements  for  admission  to  the  Freshman  class  are 
those  fixed  by  the  Association  of  Colleg-es  and  Preparatory- 
Schools  of  the  Southern  States.  No  other  college  in  Alabama 
enjoys  the  distinction  of  holding  membership  in  that  Asso- 
ciation. 

The  expenses  of  a  student  here  are  remarkably  low.  Resi- 
dents of  the  State  pay  no  tuition  in  the  academic  department. 
If  they  live  in  the  dormitories,  they  pay,  per  session  of  nine 
months,  for  board  and  lodging,  fuel,  lights,  laundry,  physician 
and  hospital  fee,  library  and  gymnasium  fees,  the  sum  of  one- 
hundred  and  fifty  dollars. 

The  alumnal  body  has  given  to  the  service  of  the  State  and 
Nation  some  of  the  ablest  and  most  distinguished  of  men.  In 
almost  every  state  of  the  Union,  whether  in  peace  or  in  war, 
whether  in  public  or  in  private  life,  they  have  performed  use- 
ful and  conspicuous  parts.  Every  field  of  endeavor  has  been 
touched  and  illumined  and  uplifted.  The  names  of  many 
of  the  alumni  add  luster  to  the  staLc's  history,  and  the  memory 
of  the  matchless  achievements  of  some  is  a  cherished  heritage 
of  the  common  country. 

Such  in  brief,  ladies  and  gentlemen,  is  the  history  of  the  in- 
stitution which  you  honor  by  your  presence  on  this  ocassion. 
I  have  recited  it  for  the  information  of  those  who  have  not 
had  opportunity  to  ^tudy  it,  and  to  refresh  the  memory  of  those 
to  whom  it  once  was  familiar. 

We  feel  highly  honored  by  the  presence  of  so  many  repre- 
sentatives of  other  colleges,  so  many  public  officials,  so  many 
representatives  of  the  press,  so  many  former  students,  so 
many  patrons,  so  many  friends.  Your  coming  brings  sincere 
pleasure  to  our  hearts,  and  we  trust  that  it  will  not  be  without 
pleasing  experiences  to  you. 

Every  officer,  every  member  of  the  Faculties,  every  student 
of  the  University  of  Alabama,  joins  me  in  extending  to  each 
and  all  a  hearty  greeting,  a  most  cordial  welcome. 


22  University  Bulletin. 

Address  of  Welcome — For  the  State  Department  of 
Education. 


By  Superintendent  Isaac  IV.  Hill. 


Ladies  and  Gentlemen : 

The  life  of  a  Republic  depends  upon  the  intelligence,  integ- 
rity, and  patriotism  of  its  citizenship.  The  government  in  a 
Republic  is  a  composite  representation  of  the  ideals  and  char- 
acter of  its  electorate.  Therefore,  in  order  to  perpetuate  its 
life  and  give  good  government  to  its  citizens,  the  most  import- 
ant duty  of  a  Republic  is  the  development  and  training  of  its 
citizenship  along  lines  ideal. 

The  trend  of  education  in  past  ages,  among  all  peoples,  has 
depended  upon  the  conception  of  the  perfect  man  formed  by 
the  leaders  of  thought.  The  people  in  general  in  no  country 
have  ever  formed  clearly  defined  ideas  of  the  true  subject  of  ed- 
ucation. They  have  always  concentrated  their  efforts  upon 
the  accumulation  of  things  material,  leaving  the  leadership 
in  the  higher  conceptions  of  life  to  those  philosophers  who  de- 
vote their  time  and  attention  to  things  immaterial.  Realizing 
this  fact,  the  founders  of  this  republic  provided  by  land  grants 
for  the  establishment  of  higher  institutions  of  learning  in 
which  leaders  of  thought  and  action  could  be  trained.  In 
accordance  with  this  plan,  this  institution  was  established  and 
opened  its  doors  for  students  in  1831.  Time  has  vindicated 
the  wisdom  of  our  forefathers.  For  seventy-five  years  the  in- 
fluence of  this  institution  has  permeated  every  nook  and  cor- 
ner of  this  great  state.  In  every  department  of  the  civic  life 
of  the  state,  her  sons  have  ever  been  found  in  the  forefront 
battling  for  the  best  interests  of  the  whole  people.  The  State 
Department  of  Education,  which  I  have  the  honor  to  repre- 
sent on  this  occasion,  owe5  its  existence  to  an  honored  son  of 
this  institution,  the  Hon.  A.  B.  Meek.  As  a  representative  from 
the  county  of  Mobile  in  the  Legislature  of  1854,  he  secured 
the  passage  of  a  law  creating  a  system  of  public  schools  for 
the  entire  state.  L^p  to  that  time,  outside  of  Mobile  County 
there  existed  no  system  of  public  schools.  No  doubt  the 
training  received  in  this  institution  led  this  distinguished  man 
"to  dream  dreams  and  to  have  visions"  of  the  time  when  every 
child  within  the  confines  of  his  beloved  Alabama  might  have 


UniversiT'i'  Bulletin.  23 

educational  advantages  extendinc?^  from  the  elementary  schools 
through  the  University  "without  fee  and  without  price."  Since 
the  establishment  of  the  system,  the  public  schools  have  passed 
through  the  vicissitudes  of  war,  of  reconstruction,  of  poverty, 
of  prejudice,  into  the  light  of  peace,  of  plenty,  and  of  universal 
approval.  After  the  lapse  of  half  a  century,  however,  they 
are  only  now  beginning  to  approximate  the  dreams  of  their 
founder.  To  Mr.  Harry  C.  Gunnels,  another  son  of  this 
institution,  is  due  the  credit  for  the  first  free  public  schools, 
with  rare  exceptions,  in  the  rural  sections  of  the  state.  As  a 
representative  in  the  Legislature  of  1900-01,  he  introduced 
and  secured  the  passage  of  a  bill  providing  for  a  minimum 
term  of  public  schools  free  from  all  tuition  fees.  Prior  to 
this  time  the  appropriation  made  by  the  state  was  apportioned 
to  the  children  and  the  amount  credited  by  the  teacher  to 
tuition  charged  the  parent. 

Under  the  laws  putting  the  provisions  of  the  new  Consti- 
tution into  operation,  and  the  law  revolutionizing  the  manage- 
ment and  control  of  the  public  school  system,  passed  by  the 
Legislature  of  1903,  the  average  length  of  school  terms  in 
about  fifty  per  cent,  of  our  counties  is  seven  months,  while  no 
county  has  an  average  term  of  less  than  five  months.  More 
money  is  needed  to  lengthen  the  school  term,  but  crying  needs 
of  the  system  at  this  time  is  better  school  houses  in  the  rural 
sections  and  rural  high  schools  in  which  the  boys  and  girls 
may  be  prepared  for  the  University.  The  University  has  stood 
for  three-quarters  of  a  century  without  any  organic  connec- 
tion W'ith  the  common  schools  of  the  State.  Let  the  sons  of 
the  University,  on  this  the  seventy-fifth  anniversary  of  their 
alma  mater,  determine  to  use  the  energy  characteristic  of  ihem 
in  the  past,  not  only  in  aiding  to  provide  comfortable  homes 
for  the  rural  schools,  but  also  in  assisting  to  bridge  the  chasm 
now  existing  between  the  elementary  schools  and  the  Univer- 
sity by  the  establishment  of  rural  high  schools.  This  noble 
work  will  prove  advantageous  to  both,  and  will  give  to  Ala- 
bama a  live,  active  public  school  system  with  the  University 
for  a  capstone. 

The  Department  of  Education  representing  every  interest  of 
public  education  welcomes  to  this  anniversary  the  representa- 
tives of  the  elementary  schools,  the  high  schools,  the  Normal 
schools,  the  technical  schools,  and  of  all  institutions  which  have 


24  University  BullivTin. 

for  their  object  the  development  and  training  of  the  young 
manhood  and  womanhood  of  the  state.  Let  us  hope  that  you 
will  feel  toward  each  other  as  members  of  one  great  family, 
and  that  when  you  return  to  your  respective  homes  you  will 
guard  zealously  every  public  school  interest.  Remember  that 
all  of  you  are  correlated  and  that  which  subserves  the  interest 
of  one  subserves  the  interest  of  all. 

To  you,  gentlemen,  who  have  come  as  representatives  of 
sister  institutions  in  the  North,  in  the  East,  in  the  South,  and 
in  the  West  to  join  us  in  the  celebration  of  this  anniversary,  the 
Department  of  Education  extends  a  most  cordial  welcome. 
The  institutions  which  you  represent  are  doing  for  your  re- 
spective states  what  this  University  is  doing  for  Alabama. 
We  rejoice  to  have  you  with  us  on  this  occasion.  We  hope 
and  believe  that  your  visit  will  redound  to  the  good  of  our 
common  country.  If  the  institutions  which  train  the  leaders 
of  thought  in  this  country  are  in  thorough  sympathy  and  har- 
mony the  one  with  the  other  the  misunderstanding  of  the  past 
can  not  be  repeated.  We  trust  your  stay  in  our  midst  may  be 
both  enjoyable  and  profitable.  Should  you  have  a  wish,  let  us 
know  it,  and  we  shall  strive  to  gratify  it.  When  you  return 
to  your  homes,  say  to  your  people  that  the  motto  of  Alabama 
along  lines  educational  is  no  longer  "Here  we  rest,"  but 
"Here  we  hustle." 

To  you,  representatives  of  the  press,  the  great  moulders  of 
public  opinion,  our  sincere  welcome  is  extended.  Your  labors 
in  the  past  have  resulted  in  much  good.  You  have  stood 
"shoulder  to  shoulder"  with  the  other  friends  of  education  in 
their  attempt  to  better  educational  conditions.  May  you 
gather  fresh  inspiration  from  this  occasion. 

To  all  here  present  the  Department  extends  a  cordial  wel- 
come with  the  earnest  wish  that  the  occasion  may  be  both 
enjoyable  and  profitable. 


It  is  greatly  regretted  that  the  address  of  welcome  for  the 
State  of  Alabama  delivered  by  His  Excellency,  William  Dorsey 
Jelks,  Governor  of  Alabama,  is  not  available  for  this  record  of 
the  celebration. 


University  Bulletin.  25 

Response  for  the  North  Atlantic  States. 


By  Professor  Josiah  Harmar  Penniman,  University  of 
Penns\lvania. 


Mr.  President : 

On  behalf  of  the  University  of  Pennsylvania  I  wish  to  thank 
you  for  the  distinguished  honor  of  being  present  today  as  the 
spokesman  of  the  Universities  of  the  North  Atlantic  States, 
and  to  convey  to  the  University  of  Alabama  cordial  greetings, 
and  congratulations  on  the  completion  of  three-quarters  of  a 
century  of  a  useful  and  honorable  career  as  one  of  the  great 
sisterhood  of  American  Universities. 

The  Universities  of  the  North  congratulate  you  on  the  fact 
that  your  lot  has  fallen  in  such  pleasant  places  and  that  your 
zeal  for  educational  work,  broad  and  deep  in  its  influences,  has 
been  at  all  times  commensurate  with  the  opportunity  by  which 
you  have  been  confronted,  and  the  need  which  has  been  im- 
perative and  insistent  in  a  land  in  which  enlightened  public 
opinion  is  the  guarantee  of  liberty. 

We  congratulate  you  on  the  fact  that  as  soon  as  Alabama 
ceased  to  be  a  territory  and  became  a  state,  the  men,  who,  in 
the  beginning,  laid  the  foundation  of  your  government,  provid- 
ed, in  the  constitution,  for  the  encouragement  and  support  of 
higher  education,  and  decreed  that  there  should  be  "a  State 
University,  for  the  promotion  of  the  arts,  literature  and  the 
sciences." 

The  nation  is  today,  in  many  respects,  as  wise  men  foresaw 
that  it  would  be,  but  it  has  surpassed  even  their  dreams.  On 
strong  and  deep  foundations  its  present  greatness  is  built. 
When  in  1753,  Dr.  William  Smith,  the  first  Provost  of  the  Uni- 
versity of  Pennsylvania,  wrote  Some  Thoughts  on  Education, 
he  said : 

"If  we  look  into  the  story  of  the  most  renowned  states  and 
kingdoms,  that  have  subsisted  in  the  different  ages  of  the 
world,  we  will  find  that  they  were  indebted  for  their  rise, 
grandeur  and  happiness  to  the  early  provisions  made  by  their 
first  founders  for  the  public  instruction  of  youth.  The  great 
sages  and  legislators  of  antiquity  were  so  sensible  of  this, 
that  they  always  made  it  their  prime  care  to  plant  seminaries 
and  regulate  the  method  of  education ;  and  many  of  them  even 


26  University  Bulletin. 

designed,  in  person  to  be  the  immediate  superintendents  of  the 
manners  of  youth,  whom  they  justly  reckoned  as  the  rising 
hopes  of  their  country." 

To  serve  the  individual  and  through  him  the  state  is  the  pur- 
pose of  the  University,  just  as  it  is  the  purpose  of  every  in- 
stitution or  organization  known  to  society.  Whether  the  Uni- 
versity exists  for  an  exalted  purpose,  or  for  mere  utilitarian- 
ism, it  must  command  attention  and  enlist  Sympathetic  sup- 
port, provided  its  purpose  is  necessary  to,  or  at  least  consist- 
ent with,  the  highest  interests  of  the  State. — Society  can  do 
for  the  individual  what  the  individual  cannot  do  for  himself, 
but  only  when  the  individual  does  his  duty  as  a  member  of  the 
social  organization.  The  relation  is  reciprocal.  The  state  can 
do  for  the  University  what  the  University  cannot  do  for 
itself,  but  it  can  do  this  only  when  the  Universit}^  performs 
faithfully  its  legitimate  and  proper  functions  in  educating  men 
and  women  to  the  conviction  that  enlightenment  and  freedom 
::re  inseparable.  The  application  of  trained  intelligence  to  tlie 
development  of  material  wealth  provides  the  wealth  with  which 
the  University  is  to  be  maintained,  and  the  cherishing  and  real- 
ization of  its  highest  and  most  spiritual  ideals  made  possible. 
"The  eye  cannot  say  unto  the  hand,  I  have  no  need  of  thee : 
nor  again,  the  head  to  the  feet,  I  have  no  need  of  you." 

The  recent  development  of  the  wealth  and  influence  of  the 
United  States  as  a  world-power  has  been  coincident  with  the 
growth  of  high-school  and  collegiate  education.  Every  m- 
crease  in  educational  opportunity  as  a  result  of  educational 
need  has  brought  forth  immediate  response  in  increased  attend- 
ance on  schools  and  colleges.  The  decades  from  1860  to 
1900,  and  inclusive  of  both,  saw  this  increase  in  the  numbers 
of  high  schools  in  the  United  States — 40,  160,  800,  2526,  6005. 
The  North  Atlantic  States  in  1890  had  786  high  schools  and 
in  1900,  1448,  not  quite  twice  as  many.  The  South  Atlantic 
States  in  1890  had  115  high  schools  and,  in  1900,  449,  nearly 
four  times  as  many.  In  1870  there  were  only  590  college  stu- 
dents to  the  million  of  population.  In  1890  there  were  880  and 
in  1900,  1284  college  students  to  the  million  of  population. 
If  time  permitted  we  could  draw  some  very  interesting  con- 
clusions from  a  comparison  of  the  statistics  of  our  increase  in 
wealth  and  our  increase  in  educational  opportunity.  Knowl- 
edge is  power,  and  to  be  a  power,  a  nation  must  be  distinguish- 


University  Bulletin.  27 

ed  not  for  its  material  posibilities.  but  for  its  intelligent  and 
educated  citizenship.  Sir  James  Mackintosh  said  "diffused 
knowledge  immortalizes  itself,"  and  the  crowning  glory  of  our 
country  is  the  freedom  and  accessibility  of  higher  education. 
To  this  fact  more  than  to  any  other,  excepting  always  the 
Providence  of  God,  is  due  the  existence  of  our  nation  today, 
an  example  to  the  world  of  the  power  of  an  enlightened  people 
to  wrest  from  their  environment  the  materials  of  national  pros- 
perity and,  greater  than  this,  to  govern  themselves. 

The  institution  of  a  University  in  a  Commonwealth  is  a 
pledge  to  the  world  by  that  Commonwealth  that  it  believes  in 
the  highest  and  best  spiritual  and  intellectual  life  as  the  safe- 
guard of  the  State.  It  would  be  wrong  to  tax  the  whole  pop- 
ulation for  the  purpose  of  giving  college  education  to  the  few 
who  are  able  to  avail  themselves  of  it,  unless  the  existence  of- 
a  body  of  highly  educated  men  and  women  in  the  Common- 
wealth v/as  regarded  as  of  value  to  the  interests  of  the  State, 
Every  state  that  maintains  institutions  of  higher  learning,  ap- 
parently for  the  few,  is  in  reality  maintaining  them  least  of  all 
for  the  few,  and  most  of  all  for  the  commonwealth. 

The  greatness  of  Alabama  is  known  to  all  who  know  the 
history  of  our  country,  and  the  history  of  the  University  is 
inseparable  from  that  of  the  State.  The  boys  who  attended 
lectures  in  the  University  have  been  the  men  who  were  an 
honor  to  the  state  and  to  the  nation,  and  contributed  their 
labors  and  their  lives  to  the  moral  and  spiritual  upbuilding  of 
a  great  people.  The  culture  of  the  nation  has  been  raised 
higher  and  higher  by  the  University  men  who  have  carried 
into  their  social  and  public  life  the  same  influences  that  were 
potent  in  moulding  their  characters.  No  words  of  mine  are 
needed  to  call  to  your  minds  the  names  and  deeds  of  alumni 
of  the  University.  Were  I  to  attempt  to  recount  them,  I 
should  not  know  where  to  begin  or  where  to  end,  for  their 
name  is  legion  and  their  achievements  are  writ  large  in  his- 
tory. 

It  is  with  pleasure  that  we  read  in  your  University  history 
the  names  of  men  who  came  to  you  from  universities  of  the 
group  I  have  the  honor  to  represent  today,  for  the  universities 
of  the  North  have  had  their  share  in  the  great  work  of  your 
seventy-five  years.  Rut  our  relations  with  you  have  been  re- 
ciprocal, for  from  the  Southern  Universities  have  come  to  us 


28  University  Bulletin. 

men  who  have  brought  into  the  hfe  and  thought  of  the  north, 
not  only  the  gentle  and  winning  graces  of  a  chivalrous  man- 
hood, which  is  the  characteristic  product  of  the  culture  and 
social  order  of  the  South,  but  also  a  scholarship  which  has 
added  to  the  influence  and  fame  of  every  institution  to  which 
they  have  come. 

Your  first  President,  Dr.  Woods,  was  a  Harvard  graduate, 
and  one  of  the  distinguished  men  of  the  Harvard  faculty  today 
went  there  from  the  University  of  Alabama.  One  of  the  most 
illustrious  names  in  the  history  of  American  education  is  that 
of  Frederick  Augustus  Porter  Barnard,  a  graduate  of  Yale, 
but  his  first  work  was  done  as  a  member  of  your  faculty,  in 
which  capacity,  in  185i,  he  wrote,  as  a  faculty  report,  one  of 
the  most  interesting  and  illuminating  books  ever  writ- 
ten on  the  much  discussed  subject,  the  college  curriculum.  It 
was  after  he  had  manifested  his  powers  and  made  his  reputa- 
tion here,  that  he  was  eagerly  sought  by  Columbia  University, 
of  which  he  became  the  great  and  wise  President. 

A  long  list  might  be  prepared  showing  the  relations  that 
have  subsisted  and  still  subsist  between  the  University  of  Ala- 
bama and  the  universities  of  the  North,  but  I  will  mention  only 
one  other  name,  that  of  the  revered  Dr.  George  A.  Ketchum, 
of  Mobile,  a  graduate  of  the  University  of  Pennsylvania,  the 
Dean  of  your  Medical  School. 

Universities,  like  the  things  they  stand  for  and  the  knowl- 
edge they  impart,  are  not  limited  in  time  and  space.  They 
draw  on  all  ages  for  their  ideas,  and  for  their  great  teachers 
they  search  the  world.  The  work  of  the  teacher  is  "not  of  an 
age,  but  for  all  time"  and  the  influence  of  a  university  is  dif- 
fusive for  good.  The  greatest  characteristic  of  a  university  is 
devotion  to  truth.  This  devotion  must  of  necessity  be  an  ex- 
ample and  an  inspiration  to  all  who  in  any  way  come  under 
its  influence.  The  sending  forth  year  by  year  of  a  body  of 
young  men,  trained  to  recognize  and  to  face  facts,  and  to  de- 
termine and  be  true  to  truth,  is  the  great  work  of  a  university 
in  its  teaching  capacity ;  the  increasing  of  the  sum  total  of 
human  knowledge  by  the  discovery  of  new  facts  and  truths, 
and  the  application  of  this  knowledge  to  life  is  the  complement 
of  its  teaching.  The  result,  however,  must  be  life,  or  be 
translatable  into  terms  of  life.  Our  social  and  public  life 
needs  university  faithfulness  to  truth.     The  judicial  attitude, 


University  Bulletin.  29 

the  unbiased  and  unprejudiced  mind,  the  intclHgent  opinion 
founded  on  fact,  the  elevation  of  soul  which  recognizes  the 
highest  happiness  in  promoting  the  true  interests  of  others — 
the  life  consecrated  to  an  honest  and  honorable  altruism  as 
the  only  source  of  permanent  joy,  is  it  not  all  this  that  we  are 
in  reality  celebrating,  when,  as  representatives  of  the  univer- 
sities of  the  land,  we  meet  to  exchange  greetings  on  this  bright 
dav  in  the  annals  of  Alabama? 


Response  For  the  South  Atlantic  States. 


By  Professor  Charles  William  Kent,   University  of  Virginia. 


His  Excellency,  the  Governor  of  Alabama,  Mr.  President,  Hon- 
orable Trustees,  Students  of  the  University  of  Alabama, 
Ladies  and  Gentlemen : 

On  this  glad  occasion,  less  significant  because  it  closes  sev- 
enty-five years  of  eventful  struggle  than  because  it  opens  the 
last  quarter  of  your  first  century  of  fruitful  efifort ;  not  more 
valuable  because  of  its  throbbing  memories  than  because  of  its 
full  promise  of  vital  purpose  and  widening  consequence,  it  is 
good  to  be  here.  Commissioned  by  the  President  of  the  Uni- 
versity of  Virginia  to  tender  his  personal  greetings  and  official 
felicitations,  I  nevertheless  share  with  you  the  regret  that 
pressing  duties  at  home  detain  him  so  that  he  cannot  in  per- 
son present  his  congratulations  in  his  own  facile  and  graceful 
phrase. 

But  T  count  it  an  honor  to  speak  in  his  stead  as  I  count  it 
a  pleasure  to  speak  in  this  presence.  I  salute  with  greetings 
from  the  University  of  Virginia,  an  elder  sister.  Elder,  how- 
ever, but  by  a  few  years  and  these  filled  with  ripening  plans  and 
big  hopes  for  the  immediate  birth  of  your  noble  institution. 
Little  wonder  that  in  those  years  the  experiment  of  founding  a 
university  in  the  Old  Dominion  was  watched  with  peculiar  in- 
terest and  instruction,  for  had  not  your  own  young  State  inter- 
linked its  earliest  history  with  that  of  Virginia! 


30  University  Bulletin. 

It  was  my  privilege  to  be  a  guest  in  your  state  when  your 
late  Constitutional  Convention  was  in  session  in  Montgomery 
and  this  fact  set  me  then  to  reading  your  romantic  history. 
In  1819,  the  date  impressed  upon  the  University  of  Virginia's 
seal,  your  first  famous  Convention  assembled  and  your  first 
constitution  was  drafted  by  Judge  Clay  of  Virginia  birth  and 
successfully  piloted  to  adoption  by  Hopkins,  Davis  and  others 
from  the  same  State.  William  Wyatt  Bibb,  your  last  territo- 
rial and  first  State  governor,  was  also  a  Virginian,  as  were 
many  others  of  official  position  who  wore  worthily  the  honors 
Alabama  heaped  upon  them.  I  was  not  ashamed  of  my  boyish 
enthusiasm  when  in  reading  of  the  famed  Canoe  Fight,  known, 
I  trust,  to  every  Alabamian  before  me,  I  learned  that  big  Sam 
Dale,  its  hero,  was  given  to  Alabama  by  the  same  rock-ribbed 
county  in  Virginia  that  gave  Houston,  the  pioneer,  to  Texas. 

But,  Mr.  President,  the  relations  between  our  two  Univer- 
sities in  those  early  days  were  just  as  close.  There  are  those 
in  this  audience  that  recall  the  old  buildings  of  the  University 
of  Alabama,  swept  away  by  the  flames  of  war,  after  Murfee 
and  Toy  had  kept  the  bridge  with  patient  daring  and  intrepid 
calm  as  worthy  of  poetic  record  as  the  brave  deed  of  old  Hora- 
tius.  The  Rotunda,  as  you  used  to  call  it,  giving  it  the  very 
name  still  worn  by  its  classic  prototype,  the  center  of  our 
architectural  scheme,  and  the  old  Lyceum,  and  these  old  homes 
with  columned  porticoes  and  classic  facades,  still  dotted  here 
and  there,  giving  an  added  charm  to  Tuscaloosa, — these  all, 
in  their  architectural  scheme,  came  to  you  directly  from  the 
University  of  Virginia  v/here  Jefferson,  our  great  founder, 
was,  with  plastic  hand,  creating  an  academic  village  of  artistic 
beauty  and  was  fostering  throughout  his  community  an  at- 
mosphere of  good  taste. 

The  position  you  yourself  occupy,  Mr.  President,  now  grown 
to  such  dignity  and  usefulness  after  its  long  history  of  vicissi- 
tudes, was  in  October,  1830,  a  few  months  before  this  Uni- 
versity opened,  tendered  to  one  of  the  distinguished  professors 
of  the  University  of  Virginia,  Dr.  Robert  Maskell  Patterson ; 
and  the  gentlemen  of  this  faculty  who  search  the  records  of 
their  predecessors  no  less  illustrious  than  themselves,  will  find 
no  brighter  name  and  no  richer  heritage  of  personal  power  than 
w^ere  left  by  Henry  Tutwiler,  one  of  your  first  professors.  In 
his  own  home  town  in  the  beautiful  valley  of  Virginia  I  have 


University  Bulletin.  31 

paused  to  pay  my  humble  tribute  to  his  memory  and  his  merit, 
and  here  where  his  work  began,  here  in  Alabama  where  his 
influence  permeated  every  corner  and  touched  every  grade  of 
life,  I  offcap  to  him,  our  honored  alumnus,  the  measure  of  our 
ideals  and  attainments. 

Thus  closely  identified  at  the  first,  it  has  always  been  true 
that  the  relations  of  these  institutions  have  been  based  upon 
mutual  respect  and  courtesy,  and  our  friendship  today  is 
strengthened  by  our  community  of  interests  in  the  large  and 
pressing-  task  of  the  higher  education  of  the  South. 

I  have  yielded,  with  hardly  an  apology  for  my  error  of  love, 
to  this  temptation  to  link  the  histories  of  our  States  and  Uni- 
versities, but  I  do  not  forget  that  the  duty  given  me  is  larger.  I 
come  not  to  bring  you  the  greetings  of  our  institution  or  of 
our  State,  but  of  all  southern  universities,  and  of  all  south- 
ern states  of  which  Virginia  and  her  University  are  but  types. 
On  your  interesting  program  you  have  provided  for  responses 
by  representatives  of  every  section  of  our  country,  and  this 
is  well,  for  it  attests  in  dramatic  fashion  the  national  solidarity 
of  education,  but  it  is  pardonable  to  add  that  those  of  us  who 
speak  for  the  southern  states,  for  that  great  empire  of  ma- 
jestic sweep  from  Potomac  to  Gulf  and  the  Father  of  Waters 
have  this  advantage  that  we  speak  for  a  homogenous  people 
and  of  problems  that  we  all  alike  are  set  to  solve.  These 
problems,  numerous  and  difficult,  arise  in  the  main  from 
two:  that  of  right  adjustment  of  our  intellectual,  social,  and 
spiritual  life  to  unknown  and  untried  material  prosperity,  and 
that  of  so  adjusting  the  rights  and  privileges  of  two  races 
that  neither  may  suffer  loss  and  each  may  have  its  proper 
growth  in  civic  efficiency.  The  southland,  of  which  Alabama 
is  so  true  a  picture,  boundless  in  resources  and  containing 
within  its  limits  the  possibilities  and  powers  of  ahnost  limit- 
less wealth,  is  on  the  threshold  of  a  future  teeming  as  well  with 
civic  opportunity  and  responsibility.  The  full  tide  of  material 
prosperity  which  Alabama  is  to  enjoy  to  the  full,  sweeps  on- 
ward, and  those  who  concern  themselves  with  little  but  ma- 
terial growth  are  radiant  with  swelling  hopefulness,  liut  lua- 
terial  prosperity  itself,  however  desirable,  and  however  cov- 
eted by  a  proud  people,  who  have  drained  the  bitter  cup  of 
poverty,  brings  in  its  own  train  its  attendant  ills  and  evils. 
The  South  has  worn  with  becoming  dignity  and  grace,  yea, 


32  University  Bulletin. 

with  a  fascinating  charm,  its  crown  of  feudal  prosperity,  and 
in  turn,  with  patient  self  respect  and  courage,  its  crown  of  suf- 
fering: will  it  assume  with  equal  power  its  sceptre  of  demo- 
cratic efficiency  ?  With  full  participation  in  all  material  move- 
ments and  in  the  councils  and  conferences  that  direct  these 
movements,  will  she,  at  the  same  time,  so  deftly  and  tactfully 
manage  her  own  affairs  as  to  bring  the  greatest  good  out  of 
her  perplexing  condition? 

That  the  love  of  money  is  the  root  of  all  evil  has  its  manifold 
illustrations  in  our  American  Republic  and  there  is  real  danger 
that  the  South  with  its  proud  record  of  public  and  personal 
honor  and  honesty  may  surrender  its  high  idealism  for  the  sor- 
did and  debasing  worship  of  money.  May  we  not  indeed 
barter  the  high  soul  of  our  distinctive  life  for  larger  barns 
in  which  to  store  heaped  wealth ! 

President  Andrew  D.  White,  in  a  recent  address,  has  found 
America's  salvation  from  this  and  other  ills  in  education.  This 
is  an  academic  solution,  and  of  moment  only  when  education 
becomes  a  solid  substance  of  three  dimensions,  affecting  body, 
mind,  and  soul,  and  when  teachers  in  education  accept  not  mere- 
ly as  an  educational  theory  but  a  fact  convertible  into  force, 
that  character  is  the  highest  outcome  of  universities.  This 
fixing  anew  of  the  fundamental  principles  and  this  solidification 
of  character  will  bring  this  hoped-for  salvation  from  material 
submergence. 

Again  the  southern  people  are  committed  not  merely  to  the 
theory  but  to  the  theory  already  incorporated  in  their  self- 
sacrificing  practice,  that  the  largest  task  nov»^  before  us,  de- 
manding the  wisest  attention  of  the  wisest  and  best  men  is  the 
education  of  all  the  people.  The  darkening  cloud  of  illiteracy 
must  be  dispelled.  The  indifference  of  many  of  our  people  to 
education,  because  they  have  ceased  to  believe  in  its  commercial 
value,  will  be  changed  to  vital  activity,  when  they  are  again 
convinced  that  it  is  the  necessary  means  to  individual  promo- 
tion and  national  progress. 

Educational  statesmanship  must  plan  wisely  and  with  catho- 
licity for  the  education  of  all  the  people,  white  and  colored, 
bearing  always  in  mind  that  education  must  be  fitted  to  those 
that  receive  it  and  to  the  part  in  the  nation's  life  they  will  be 
called  upon  to  play. 


University  Bulletin.  33 

To  the  solution  of  this  problem  of  general  education  the 
Universities,  flushed  with  the  spirit  of  triumphant  de- 
mocracy, must  give  ungrudging  time,  patient  counsel,  and  the 
sympathetic  help  of  actual  participation  and  leadership. 

The  old  figures  under  which  the  University  was  pictured 
are  largely  outworn.  Today  it  must  lead  in  every  great 
movement  that  has  in  view  the  sane  democratization  of  our 
civil  hfe.  The  University,  too,  will  set  the  tone  and  fix  the 
limits  of  this  popular  education,  for  no  training  within  the 
State  wall  be  higher  than  the  ends  set  before  herself  by  the 
State  University. 

Mr.  President,  I  believe  that  the  University  of  Alabama  is 
set  in  the  heart  of  this  honored  commonwealth  for  some 
high  purpose  such  as  this — to  forward  the  solution  of  these 
great  problems  of  adjustment — and  that  its  opportunity  widens 
with  the  growing  years  to  exercise  a  wise  and  beneficent  influ- 
ence on  the  whole  education  of  the  South.  Therefore  I  dare 
bespeak  for  it  the  good  wishes  and  God-speed  of  the  States 
of  the  South  Atlantic  Seaboard. 

I  wish  for  you,  Mr.  President,  virile  courage  and  generous 
support  in  the  leadership  you  have  been  called  to  assume.  To 
this  noble  University,  focussing  within  itself  the  history  and 
temper  of  your  State  through  more  than  a  man's  allotted 
years  and  shedding  light  that  at  once  may  fill  with  glory  aiul 
infuse  with  life  the  closing  years  of  its  first  century,  I  ex- 
claim, hail !  all  hail !  And  may  the  great  State  of  Alabama 
so  cherish  her  noble  fame  and  so  confide  in  her  ennobling  ser- 
vices that  it  will  gladly  furnish  all  needed  sustenance  for  the 
developing  strength  of  the  University  of  Alabama 


Response  for  the  South  Central  States. 


By  President  Broivn  Ayres,  University  of  Tennessee. 


The  University  of  Tennessee  is  the  oldest  of  the  State  in- 
stitutions of  the  South  Central  States.  It  is  therefore  with 
a  special  propriety  that  the  duty  is  assigned  to  its  represen- 
tative to  speak  a  word  of  greeting  for  this  group  of  states 


34  University  Bulletin. 

on  the  auspicious  occasion  that  you  are  now  celebrating.  There 
is  also  a  special  fitness  in  this  word  of  cheer  and  Godspeed 
from  the  University  of  Tennessee,  in  the  fact  that  many  of  its 
early  alumni  came  to  the  State  of  Alabama  in  the  beginning 
of  the  making  of  this  commonwealth  and  contributed  in  no 
small  degree  to  the  establishment  of  the  government  that 
brought  about  the  foundation  of  this  University.  The  broad- 
minded  statesmanship  of  the  founders  of  the  new  states  now 
constituting  the  territory  which  I  am  designated  to  represent 
is  shown  in  no  way  so  well  as  by  the  fact  that  without  excep- 
tion they  adopted  as  a  guide  the  celebrated  Ordinance  for  the 
Government  of  the  Northwest  Territory,  one  of  the  articles 
of  compact  of  which  ordinance  is  expressed  in  these  signifi- 
cant words :  "Religion,  Morality  and  Knowledge  being  neces- 
sary to  good  government  and  the  happiness  of  mankind, 
schools  and  the  means  of  education  shall  forever  be  encour- 
aged." This  ordinance  became  the  fundamental  law  of  the 
land  of  Tennessee  and  later  on  of  all  the  South  Central  States. 
The  Constitutional  Convention,  which  met  at  Huntsville,  on 
July  5,  1819,  was  guided  by  the  principles  thus  set  forth.  It 
is  a  matter  of  congratulation  to  you  that  in  the  early  days  when 
the  physical  and  material  conditions  to  be  surmounted  in  the 
development  of  a  virgin  country  were  so  great  the  men  who 
had  this  task  to  perform  were  not  negligent  of  the  greater  and 
the  higher  task  of  providing  for  the  development  of  the  spirit 
of  the  people  that  were  to  inhabit  the  land  that  they  were  pre- 
paring for  them.  Thus  your  University  came  into  being,  and 
in  a  long  and  honorable  career  it  has  justified  the  wisdom  of  its 
founders  and  been  a  blessing  to  the  men  and  women  of  its 
state. 

The  older  institutions,  like  your  University  and  my  Uni- 
versity, have  a  right,  I  think,  to  some  of  the  pride  that  char- 
acterizes the  "old  families,"  and  are  inclined  to  look  down 
somewhat  on  the  new  fledglings  that  are  springing  up  on  every 
side,  in  the  way  that  the  old  families  look  down  on  the  nou- 
veaux  riches.  For  our  founding  took  place  when  it  meant 
real  sacrifice  and  real  effort  to  do  the  things  that  were  done, 
while  much  of  the  founding  that  is  done  in  these  days  seems 
to  us,  at  least,  to  be  marvelously  easy.  With  our  pride  of 
family,  however,  goes  the  poverty  that  seems  to  be  rather  a 


University  Bulletin.  35 

natural   accompaniment   in   this   section   in   these    latter   days, 
and  this  poverty  is  a  serious  handicap  to  our  efforts. 

Our  aristocratic  inclinations  have,  however,  had  something 
to  do  with  the  continuance  of  our  poverty.  Aristocracy  takes 
little  thou£^ht  for  the  needs  of  others  than  the  members  of  its 
own  charmed  circle.  The  University  that  bears  the  name  of 
a  great  commonwealth,  however,  must  be  not  content  with 
any  limited  interest  or  the  service  of  any  favored  class  of  peo- 
ple. It  must  live  for  and  work  for  the  great  body  of  the  com- 
mon people  if  it  hopes  to  receive  from  them  such  recognition 
and  support  as  will  justify  its  claim  to  be  in  the  truest  sense  the 
University  of  the  State.  Our  southern  state  institutions  in 
particular  need  to  take  to  heart  the  facts  that  I  have  just 
stated,  and  to  strive  to  so  become  the  useful  agencies  to  the 
development  of  the  higher  civilization  of  their  communities  as 
will  cause  the  people  of  all  classes  "to  rise  up  and  call  them 
blessed." 

Perhaps  the  most  striking  and  significant  phenomenon  of 
the  educational  development  of  the  last  quarter  of  a  century 
has  been  the  extraordinary  growth  and  success  of  the  great 
State  universities  of  the  middle  west  and  the  Pacific  coast. 
Beginning  as  they  usually  did  with  the  more  special  conside- 
ration of  the  needs  of  agriculture  and  mechanic  arts,  they 
have  gradually  enlarged  the  sphere  of  their  activities  and  in- 
fluence until  now  they  occupy  almost  the  whole  realm  of  hu- 
man knowledge,  and  appeal  to  all  classes  of  citizens.  Where 
a  few  years  back  their  students  were  numbered  by  hundreds 
they  are  now  numbered  by  the  thousands  and  the  annual  appro- 
priations received  from  the  state  legislatures  by  many  of  them 
would  have  been  considered  adequate  endowment  for  universi- 
ties a  generation  ago.  The  actual  service  that  they  render  to 
their  several  communities  can  hardly  be  reckoned  in  dollars 
and  cents,  yet  on  this  basis  alone  it  has  come  to  be  recognized 
that  their  direct  return  far  exceeds  the  cash  outlay  required  to 
keep  them  going  and  expanding.  Their  history  seems  to  es- 
tablish most  clearly  the  value  of  this  type  of  institution  to  an 
undeveloped  and  developing  country.  They  are  the  "colleges 
of  the  people"  and  the  people,  in  this  sense,  constitute  by  far 
the  majority  of  the  population.  I  commend  the  example  of 
these  institutions  to  the  state  universities  of  our  southern 
states.     By  following  their  lead,  by  emulating  their  example, 


36  University  Bulletin. 

we  may  hope  to  obtain  for  our  state  and  for  our  people  the 
blessings  of  education  that  are  now  in  a  measure  denied 
them. 

The  university  and  the  state !  Time  was  when  little  di- 
rect relation  existed  between  them.  The  university  was 
thought  of  as  the  abode  of  the  recluse  and  the  mystic — a  place 
where  the  matters  dealt  with  had  relation  more  to  the  world 
tc-  come  than  to  the  busy  marts  of  trade  or  to  the  social  insti- 
tutions of  the  world  now  here.  But  all  this  has  changed.  We 
now  know  that  the  university  has  no  sufficient  justification  for 
its  existence  unless  it  throws  in  its  lot  with  the  state  and  the 
community  in  which  it  is  situated  and  to  which  it  belongs  and 
strives  to  minister  to  their  upbuilding.  Let  it  stand  for  ideals — 
but  these  ideals  need  not  be  dreams'.  Its  opportunity,  in  fact,  is 
to  dream — but  not  be  content  with  dreaming  but  to  take  its 
place  in  the  forefront  of  the  battle  for  its  state's  advancement, 
and  there  to  realize  its  dreams  in  the  added  power  which  its 
presence  and  its  influence  will  yield.  There  is  a  lesson  here 
for  us  to  learn,  and  my  earnest  hope  is  that  it  may  be  learned 
and  that  its  learning  may  be  fruitful  in  bringing  about  a  con- 
dition in  our  southern  education  that  is  so  devoutly  to  be 
wished. 

I  believe,  Mr.  President,  that  there  are  clear  evidences  that 
the  facts  that  I  have  stated  are  familiar  to  you  and  that  in 
your  administration  this  university  has  made  great  strides  in 
adapting  itself  to  the  needs  of  a  developing  and  rich  state  like 
Alabama.  I  congratulate  you,  sir,  on  the  success  that  has  at- 
tended your  efforts  to  make  here  an  institution  at  the  head  of 
the  public  school  system  of  the  state  that  will  in  every  sense  be 
a  vivifying  influence  reaching  out  to  all  the  schools  and  tend- 
ing to  build  up  the  system  of  the  state  in  accord  with  the 
highest  modern  ideals.  Your  wide  educational  experience 
and  your  public  spirit  has  alike  contributed  to  this  end.  I 
rejoice  that  the  way  is  open  in  Alabama  to  the  achievement  of 
great  things. 

Superintendent  Hill  has  told  us  that  the  meaning  of  the 
name  of  this  State  has  changed  from  "Alabama,  here  w^e  rest," 
to  "Alabama,  here  we  hustle."  True  it  is  that  a  great  change 
has  come  over  this  state  and  the  whole  of  the  Southland  in 
the  last  quarter  of  a  century.  This  change  is  permanent  and 
deep-seated.     It  is  well  illustrated  in  the  story  of  the  old  dar- 


University  Bulletin.  37 

key  preacher,  who,  in  attempting;  to  give  his  congregation  a 
notion  of  the  changed  conditions  said :  "Brcddern,  things  aint 
now  hke  they  was  befo'  de  wah.  Befo'  de  wah  we  went  slow. 
We  ate  breakfast  late  and  after  dinner  ole  massa  and  ole  miss 
bofe  took  a  nap  and  each  of  dem  had  two  little  niggers  to  fan 
'em  and  keep  off  de  flies.  Now  we  gets  up  early  and  keeps 
agoing  all  day.  In  the  olden  times  we  kep'  time  by  an  old 
grandfather's  clock  dat  stood  in  de  corner  of  de  hall,  and  said, 
"Ever,  forever,  never,  forever."  Now  we  keep  time  by  a 
Waterbiiry  watch  dat  says,  "Git  thar,  git  thar,  git  thar,  git 
thar."  This  surely  represents  the  changed  conditions  in  the 
South.  The  man  who  attempts  to  keep  time  by  the  grand- 
father's clock  will  surely  fail  to  "git  thar." 

The  modern  hustling  spirit  will  necessarily  place  on  you. 
sir,  both  a  duty  and  an  incentive ;  and  I  congratulate  you  that 
you  are  responding  most  splendidly  to  the  influence  thus  being 
exerted. 

And  now,  in  behalf  not  only  of  my  own  institution  and  the 
state  it  represents,  but  on  behalf  of  the  sister  institutions  of  the 
section  that  has  followed  the  state  of  Tennessee  in  its  develop- 
ment and  in  its  admission  to  statehood,  I  extend  my  heartiest 
congratulations  on  this  happy  occasion  and  hope  for  the  Uni- 
versity of  Alabama  many  long  years  of  prosperity  and  effective 
work  for  the  upbuilding  of  its  commonwealth. 


The  response  for  the  North  Central  States  was  not  given  in 
the  absence  of  President  Edmund  J.  James,  of  the  University 
of  Illinois. 


38  University  Bulletin. 

Response  for  the  Western  States 

By  Professor  Thomas  Walker  Page,  Universiiy  of  California. 


I  feel  in  a  somewhat  false  position  that  I  should  be  asked  to 
respond  in  the  name  of  the  West  to  the  welcome  you  extend  to 
us.  For  in  my  heart  I  feel  that  I  am  as  much  a  Southerner  as 
any  man  amongst  you.  Most  of  my  life  has  been  spent  in  the 
South  and  I  take  pride  in  my  heritage  of  Southern  traditions, 
of  Southern  blood,  and — let  me  add — of  some  strongly  marked 
Southern  prejudices.  And  I  am  glad  that  I  can  say  this  in 
all  loyalty  and  faith  to  the  great  region,  I  will  not  say  of  my 
adoption  but  rather,  to  the  hospitable,  the  great  and  bounteous 
region  that  extends  her  bounty  equally  to  the  men  of  the  South 
and  of  the  North,  of  all  parts  of  this  broad  continent.  In  the 
old  continental  congress  it  was  Patrick  Henry,  a  Southern 
speaker,  who  pronounced  imaginary  boundary  lines  abolished, 
who  said  that  in  resisting  wrong  we  are  no  longer  Carolinians, 
Virginians,  nor  men  of  New  York  or  Massachusetts  we  are  all 
Americans.  This  sentiment  emanating  from  the  South  is 
preserved  today  in  greatest  purity  where  all  was  then  a  wilder- 
ness but  where  there  reigns  a  civilization  to  which  all  sections 
have  contributed. 

Petty  questions  may  divide  us,  local  tone  and  color  may  dis- 
tinguish us — to  add  beauty  and  variety  to  American  life — but 
in  time  of  danger  or  distress  we  know  that  the  cause  of  one  is 
the  cause  of  all.  And  this  was  never  more  apparent  than  in  re- 
cent weeks  when  the  queenly  city  at  the  Golden  Gate,  that 
reared  her  towers  amid  the  surrounding  magnificence  of  flood 
and  mountain  suddenly,  without  warning,  was  laid  in  ruins. 
In  the  face  of  the  most  overwhelming  calamity  that  the  mod- 
ern world  has  known  the  whole  nation  responded  with  sympa- 
thy and  aid.  And  it  will  not  find  its  assistance  unworthily 
bestowed.  "What  a  wonderful  people  is  this",  said  a  German 
traveller,  "three  days  after  the  fire  I  heard  the  men  of  this 
city  wandering  over  four  square  miles  of  stones  and  ashes 
plan  to  hold  a  world's  fair  in  six  years." 

In  the  building  of  this  nation  the  men  of  the  West  take  pride 
in  what  they  have  already  done  and  know  that  they  must  do  yet 
more.     At  the  same  time  they  believe  that  the  older  regions 


University  Bulletin.  39 

will  not  cease  to  use  the  mighty  power  for  good  that  they  have 
exercised  in  the  past.  From  each  region  they  expect  certain 
things,  and  much,  very  much,  that  the  twentieth  century  can 
not  do  without,  they  look  for  from  the  South.  For  forty  years 
it  was  usual  to  hear  that  the  Old  South  is  gone.  That  in  the 
glare  of  war,  in  the  blaze  of  a  thousand  battles,  the  Southern 
system  went  down.  It  perished  in  the  war,  perished 
with  its  hideous  institution  of  slavery,  perished  with  conditions 
of  life  that  in  Washington  and  Lee  and  a  multitude  of  others 
produced  the  highest  type  of  the  man  and  the  gentleman  that 
the  Western  world  has  known.  In  the  story  of  the  lost  cause 
were  woven  all  the  elements  of  tragedy,  but  the  greatest  trag- 
edy involved  was  this :  that  in  this  rich  and  potent  region 
strength  and  leadership  and  wisdom  had  given  place  to  preju- 
dice, languor  and  decay. 

But  the  West  does  not  now  believe  this  doctrine.  We  have 
seen  the  mighty  strides  to  prosperity  that  you  have  already 
made.  We  know  that  you  will  not  sit  impotently  basking 
in  the  light  of  other  days,  drugging  your  mind  with  vainglo- 
rious boasting  of  the  deeds  of  your  fathers',  while 
civilization  passes  around  and  beyond  you.  The  spirit 
of  commence  and  enterprise  has  already  crossed  your 
borders,  again  to  make  fruitful  your  valleys,  to  people  your 
towns,  and  to  draw  wealth  from  your  harbors,  your  mines  and 
your  forests.  But  what  the  nation  specially  hopes  is  that 
along  with  this  new  commercialism  the  spirit  of  your  fathers 
yet  ranges  in  the  land,  that  the  high  ideals  of  a  day  that  is 
gone  will  not  be  lowered  by  the  leaders  of  the  New  South  that 
has  arisen. 

In  the  promotion  of  your  material  interests,  in  the  reorgani- 
zation of  your  political  institutions,  in  dealing  with  your  grave 
race  problem  the  nation  now  after  a  generation  of  miscom- 
prehension is  inclined  to  leave  you  a  free  hand.  It  believes 
that  as  you  grow  strong  you  will  be  merciful,  as  you  are  wise 
you  will  be  just.  It  prays  that  the  brightest  virtues  of  your 
forbears  may  live  in  practice  as  well  as  in  tradition. 

That  this  may  be,  we  turn  with  hope  to  this  institution  and 
others  like  it  in  the  Southern  States.  Beyond  a  doubt  a  share 
of  the  wealth  that  is  growing  in  this  region  will  go  to  higher 
education.  You  will  develop  your  departments  in  engineering, 
commerce,   agriculture   and   other   practical    fields.      May   we 


40  University  Bulletin. 

not  hope  that  you  will  never  neglect  the  culture  side  of  educa- 
tion, and  that  the  making  of  character  will  remain  as  much 
a  part  of  your  work  as  the  making  of  scientific  experts.  We 
trust  that  the  youths  you  prepare  for  life  will  be  able  not  only 
to  gather  the  moulted  feathers'  from  the  wing  of  Calhoun's 
eloquence  but  also  to  echo  the  sentiment  of  that  other  Southern 
statesman  who  would  rather  be  right  than  be  president.  And 
so,  sir,  from  our  University  opposite  the  Golden  Gate — sorely 
smitten  for  His  own  purposes  by  the  hand  of  God — but  with 
undiminished  zeal  and  vigor  in  the  cause  we  have  at  heart,  I 
bring  you  greetings  and  the  cordial  assurance  that  we  look  with 
respect  to  the  past  and  with  confidence  to  the  future  of  this 
your  old  and  honorable  institution. 


Response  for  Sister  State  Institutions. 


By  President  Charles  Coleman   Thach,  Alabama  Polytechnic 

Institute. 


Mr.  President,  Gentlemen  of  the  Board  of  Trustees,  the  Fac- 
ulty, Ladies  and  Gentlemen : 

It  is  with  peculiar  pleasure  that  I  come  to  this  festival,  the 
coronal  of  your  seventy-fifth  anniversary,  as  the  representa- 
tive of  your  younger  sister,  the  Alabama  Polytechnic  Institute 
(or  as  we  love  to  call  her,  "Auburn"),  to  bring  to  the  Board 
of  Trustees,  Faculty,  and  student  body  of  the  University  of 
Alabama  our  most  cordial  greetings  and  hearty  felicitations 
upon  this  happy  event. 

In  the  first  instance  I  may  be  permitted  to  say  that  the  many 
acts  of  gracious  courtesy  and  honor  extended  to  me  by  your 
University  in  the  past  can  but  create  a  lively  sense  of  personal 
attachment  to  your  institution,  and  personal  interest  in  her 
welfare  and  happiness.  By  adoption,  I  trace  a  very  highly  es- 
teemed strain  of  my  academic  lineage  from  your  honorable 


University  Bulletin.  41 

Faculty  and  Board,  and  though  my  stock  be  Orange  and  Blue, 
yet  I  point  with  pride  to  the  cross  of  Crimson  and  White — and 
so  your  happiness  today  is  my  personal  delight. 

In  the  second  instance,  it  is  my  delight  to  greet  you  officially 
in  behalf  of  the  Officers  and  Faculty  of  your  sister  State  in- 
stitution, and  to  acknowledge  our  keen  appreciation  of  your 
invitation  to  voice  upon  this  auspicious  occasion  the  good  will 
of  your  sister  colleges  in  Alabama.  We  accept  the  kindly  act 
in  the  same  high  kindly  spirit,  and  hail  the  omen  as  an  augury 
of  the  perpetuation  of  the  good  fellowship  and  fine,  liberal  re- 
lations that  exist  between  the  two  colleges.  For  some,  there 
may  be  periods  of  stress  and  fierce  emulation,  when  certain 
young  barbarians  are  at  play  upon  those  arenas  that  we  call 
the  gridiron  or  the  diamond — but  who  does  not  love,  a  foe- 
man  worthy  of  his  steel,  or  "to  shoulder  his  crutch  and  fight 
his  battles  o'er,"  and  then  the  air  again  becomes  all  peaceful, 
tranquil  and  serene. 

In  all  seriousness,  however,  I  rejoice  to  say  that  the  relations 
of  the  sister  institutions  of  higher  learning  in  Alabama  are 
those  of  warm  comradeship  and  earnest  co-operation  in  the 
great  crusade  we  are  waging  for  light  and  for  righteousness. 
And  this  is  well.  For  there  is  room  for  all,  and  to  spare.  Our 
educational  forces  are  but  a  little  band,  a  phalanx,  and  we  must 
present  a  solid  front  to  the  ranks  of  ignorance  that  stretch  in 
serried  array  beyond  the  sight.  While  it  must  ever  be  borne  in 
mind  that  the  field  of  educational  endeavor  is  as  wide  as  the 
universe,  containing  on  the  one  side,  all  of  the  history  and  phi- 
losophy of  the  strange  voyagings  on  land  and  sea,  and  in  mind 
and  heart  of  him  we  call  man ;  and  on  the  other  the  equally 
marvelous  philosophy  of  the  world  of  nature  and  her  forces, 
on  the  shores  of  whose  strange  seas,  science  has  gathered  as 
yet  but  a  few  shells.  "Unity  in  diversity"  is  our  legend.  It  is 
the  law  of  our  great  nation,  the  law  of  all  complex  life,  the  law 
of  all  higher  development. 

Your  seventy-fifth  anniversary — three  quarters  of  a  century 
— not  a  long  time  as  ages  go,  but  quite  a  large  section  of  the 
time  that  Alabama  has  existed  as  a  state  ?  And  in  the  history 
of  the  higher  life  of  the  state  the  institution  has  been  a  per- 
manent and  efficient  factor.  The  recital  of  that  story  falls 
to  other  and  worthier  hands ;  but  I  can  not  forbear  a  word  of 
note.     Like  all  institutions,  the  University  of  Alabama  has 


42  University  Bulletin. 

been  through  sunshine  and  through  stormy  weather.  The 
loss  at  an  early  date  of  much  of  its  splendid  estate  through 
the  craze  of  wild-cat  banks,  one  of  the  waves  of  hysterical 
finance  which  periodically  sweep  over  society ;  later  the  ruth- 
less destruction  by  the  torch  of  war  of  its  spacious  buildings 
and  extensive  equipment ;  but  still  later  the  tragic  yet  at  times 
comical  experiences  of  the  days  of  reconstruction, — all  these 
are  matters  of  record.  And  yet,  despite  these  serious  hard- 
ships, the  lamp  of  learning  has  been  kept  steadily  burning, 
the  standards  of  plain  living  and  high  thinking  have  been 
preserved,  and  high  traditions  of  science  and  scholarship  hand- 
ed down  to  succeeding  generations  of  Alabama  youth.  Tut- 
w^ler,  Barnard,  Manly,  Tuomey,  Carlos  G.  Smith,  Meek,  really 
great  and  illustrious  all  these  were ;  and  their  fame  and  achieve- 
ment constitute  a  rich  legacy  and  a  mighty  inspiration,  not 
only  for  your  own  institution  but  for  all  loyal  Alabamians 
who  love  and  have  pride  in  the  higher  life  of  our  state. 

"Noblesse  oblige,"  I  say,  young  students.  Live  to  the  high 
mark  they  have  set ;  and  hand  down  the  legacy  of  their  sound 
learning  and  accurate  scholarship  unbroken  and  undiminished. 
Reverence  this  past  and  preserve  its  memories ;  for  a  man  or  an 
institution  that  cares  naught  for  the  past, — well,  the  future 
will  care  naught  for  them. 

And  what  of  the  future  of  the  University?  If  I  may  be  per- 
mitted to  say  so,  it  seems  most  bright  and  reassuring  in  the 
light  of  this  happy  anniversary  day.  Prosperity,  activity,  ini- 
tiative, inspiration,  hope, — all  are  in  the  air.  Vigor  and  life 
have  characterized  the  administration ;  and  today  the  one  thing 
needed,  (and  it  is  needed  in  various  educational  localities),  is 
larger  financial  resources ;  and  relief  must  come  and  will  come. 
Our  commonwealth  has  long  been  a  victim  of  disordered 
finance  and  prostrated  commerce  incident  to  the  terrible  cata- 
clysm of  1860-1865;  and  out  of  her  scantiness,  the  state  has 
given  as  bountifully  as  she  could.  But  the  lean  days  are  passing, 
we  hope.  The  story  of  our  magical  industrial  new  birth  is  a 
story  known  to  all.  The  rapid  rehabilitation  of  our  state  under 
the  magical  touch  of  science  and  trade  is  verily  one  of  the  tri- 
umphs and  marvels  of  the  period.  And  all  of  these  mighty  cit- 
ies, these  great  and  lucrative  industries,  this  iron  and 
this  coal,  which  like  giants  have  lain  sleeping  for  ages 
under  our  old  red  hills  but  are  now  awakening  and  stretching 


University  Bulletin.  43 

into  life  and  activity — all  these  must  contribute  in  ever  in- 
creasing proportions  to  the  prosperity  of  our  higher  institu- 
tions of  learning.  I  say  must  contribute,  for  in  the  final  analy- 
sis of  the  prosperity  and  perpetuity  of  any  state,  there  surely 
is  no  influence  so  constant  and  so  powerful  as  that  contributed 
by  its  institutions  of  higher  learning.  All  history  attests  the 
fact.  The  Renaissance,  the  new  birth,  the  emergence  of  Eu- 
rope from  the  dark  ages  into  the  art  and  culture  of  modern 
times — all  this  was  work  of  the  higher  institutions  of  learning 
in  Bologna,  Florence  and  Pisa.  The  intellectual  predominance 
of  France  marches  with  the  development  and  prosperity  of 
the  great  Sorbonne  and  other  illustrious  schools  of  Paris. 
Freedom  of  conscience  and  intellectual  liberty  in  the  Teutonic 
race  that  culminated  in  Luther  and  have  been  perpetuated  in 
modern  times,  have  been  the  products  of  the  German  Universi- 
ties ;  while  it  is  equally  true  that  these  two  cardinal  qualities 
of  Anglo-Saxon  civilization  have  ever  found  their  champions 
and  their  martyrs  in  the  academic  quiet  and  seclusion  of  the 
two  great  Universities  of  Oxford  and  Cambridge.  Truly,  light 
Cometh  from  above.  And  all  great  movements  of  uplift  in 
society,  in  art,  in  education,  in  material  welfare  start  at  the 
top.  It  is  from  the  highly  trained,  "fit  but  few,"  that  great 
ideas  originate,  and  by  filtration  come  to  permeate  the  mass 
below.  Only  at  her  peril  can  a  state  neglect  her  higher  insti- 
tutions of  learning. 

Mr.  President,  let  the  Board  of  Trustees,  the  faculty,  the 
alumni,  and  the  student  body  of  the  University  insistently 
preach  this  evangel,  push  this  propaganda,  until  the  people 
of  Alabama  come  to  appreciate  more  fully  the  importance  of 
higher  education ;  and  their  representatives  are  willing  to  make 
adequate  provisions  for  the  imperative  work.  Surely  it  is  not 
an  elemosynary  act, — this  investment  of  the  revenues  of  a  state 
in  the  brains  of  her  children.  It  far  surpasses  an  investment 
in  wild  cat  banks  or  even  in  the  most  reliable  securities ;  for  it 
speedily  bears  a  hundred  fold  return  to  the  state  in  material 
as  well  as  in  spiritual  results. 

And  I  take  it  that  this  anniversary  day  is  not  only  a  day  of 
dear  memories  and  tender  voices  out  of  the  depths  of  the  past ; 
but  that  it  is  a  day  that  looks  as  well  to  the  future.  It  is  a  day 
of  enthusiasms  and  it  is  to  be  hoped  that  their  fine  contagion 


44  University  Bulletin. 

will  spread  in  ever  widening  circles,  until  the  farthest  nooks 
of  the  hinterland  feel  the  responsive  thrill  and  feel  a  quick- 
ened pulse  of  intellectual  life  and  aspiration. 

And  what  more  inspiring"  conditions  could  be  asked  to  give 
full  significance  to  the  occasion?  This  lovely  day  in  May, 
this  wide-spread  shade  of  Druid-like  oaks,  this  august  gath- 
ering of  law-makers,  this  assembling  of  the  alumni,  this  meet- 
ing of  the  old  and  new  from  far  and  near, — all  these  are  here, 
as  it  were,  to  pay  tribute  to  this  event,  and  all  these  go  to  cre- 
ate a  day  of  educational  revival,  and  educational  rally  of  the 
highest  significance.  And  here,  too,  have  come  the  delegated 
ambassadors  of  many  of  the  high  seats  of  learning  in  our 
great  nation.  The  University  of  Pennsylvania,  one  of  the  old- 
est and  most  famous  in  the  nation;  the  University  of  Vir- 
ginia, one  of  the  greatest  moulding  influences  in  Southern  civi- 
lization, its  founder  the  immortal  Jefferson,  whose  work  in  its 
establishment  he  deemed  an  honor  to  be  inscribed  in  his  epi- 
taph ;  the  growing  young  giants  of  the  middle  west,  these  oth- 
ers have  come  to  join  us  in  Alabama  to  celebrate  the  birthday 
of  our  State  University.  Truly,  learning  and  knowledge  know 
no  line  of  latitude  or  of  longitude.  There  are  no  geographical 
delineations  in  science  and  in  art;  the  work  and  the  workers 
are  not  cribbed,  cabined  and  confined,  but  are  universal  in  their 
nature,  not  for  an  age  but  for  all  time. 

And  so,  I  end  as  I  Degan,  with  the  sentiment  "Unity  in  di- 
versity." I  again  express  the  hearty  congratulations  of  "Au- 
burn" to  the  University  of  Alabama  upon  this  glad  day.  We 
wish  you  many  happy  returns,  and  we  pray  that  the  sun  which 
is  breaking  so  joyously  over  your  eastern  hills  may  grow  in 
brightness  even  unto  the  perfect  day,  even  unto  the  fulfillment 
of  the  brightest  hopes  of  its  most  loyal  sons  and  friends. 


University  Bulletin.  45 

Response  for  the  Press  of  Alabama. 


By  Rufns  Napoleon  Rhodes,  Editor  Birmingham  Ncivs. 


Mr.  President : 

I  thank  you  for  the  honor  you  have  conferred  upon  me — the 
privilege  of  being-  associated  with  you,  your  great  institution 
and  your  distinguished  guests,  upon  this  solemn  and  deHghtful 
occasion.  There  are  few  festivals,  which  so  appeal  to  a  re- 
flective and  imaginative  mind,  as  the  celebration  of  the  found- 
ing of  an  historic  seat  of  learning.  The  past,  present  and 
future  are  brought  close  together.  Thoughts  and  emotions, 
recollections  and  hopes,  crowd  the  brain  and  thrill  the  heart. 
It  is  a  difficult  task  to  choose  what  to  note,  what  to  give  ut- 
terance and  emphasis. 

The  hundred  years  immediately  before  the  establishment  of 
the  University  of  Alabama  were  infinitely  rich  in  benefits  to 
the  human  race.  No  century  had  witnessed  such  tremendous 
advancement  in  commerce  and  manufacture,  in  scholarship,- 
literature,  science,  music  and  art,  in  political  economy  and  free- 
dom. The  American  republic  had  been  established,  and  was 
holding  aloft  the  torch  of  liberty,  enlightening  the  world.  An- 
drew Jackson — "Old  Hickory" — was  President  of  the  United 
States.  He  was  the  typical  American.  Hard  work,  good  hab- 
its, endurance,  courage,  loyalty,  intelligence  and  faith  then 
characterized  the  American  people.  It  was  a  notable  era.  AIJ 
were  pioneers  or  descendants  of  pioneers.  They  were  ac- 
quainted with  hardships  and  were  in  nothing  daunted.  They 
knew  that  the  prime  requirement  of  good  citizenship  in  z. 
country  of  free  institutions  was  education,  enlightenment  and 
character,  as  universal  as  the  units' — the  individual  voters  — 
and  that  the  instrumentalities  to  secure  and  promote  education, 
enlightenment  and  character  could  be  developed  and  perfected 
quickest  and  best  by  and  at  the  expense  of  the  state.  Out  of 
these  convictions  came  the  American  public  school  system  and 
out  of  them  also  came  the  Universities  of  the  several  states 
and  the  University  of  Alabama. 

The  Southern  States,  comparatively  speaking,  were  then 
enormously  rich  and  prodigiously     prosperous.     High     prices 


46  Univi;Rsity  Bulletin. 

were  commanded  in  all  the  markets  of  the  world  for  every- 
thin,c,-  its  people  could  produce.  The  South  was  "in  the  saddle" 
in  politics,  and  the  genius  of  its  statesmen  and  the  eloquence 
of  its  orators  gilded  every  page  of  American  history. 

Such  was  the  satisfactory  situation  when  the  University  of 
Alabama  was  founded,  and  for  two  decades  and  a  half  condi- 
tions continued  normal.  A  qviarter  of  a  century  after  its 
foimdation,  in  the  year  185G,  James  Buchanan  was  elected 
President  of  the  United  States.  He  was  a  friend  of  the 
South.  He  was  the  last  chief  executive  of  the  United  States, 
who  undertook  to  study  and  know  the  sentiments  and  aspira- 
tions, the  problems,  failures  and  triumphs  of  the  South,  until 
President  Roosevelt  but  recently  undertook  to  possess  himself 
of  a  little  real  knowledge  of  this  vast  and  opulent  empire,  in 
which,  under  his  oath  of  office,  he  has  to  see  to  it  "that  the 
laws  are  executed."  But  in  1856  the  clouds  were  already  gath- 
ering for  the  inevitable,  irresponsible  conflict,  which  in  1861 
burst  in  fury,  drenching  the  land  in  blood  and  consuming  mil- 
lions and  millions  of  treasure.  War,  defeat  and  reconstruction 
blighted  the  Southland.  It  was  the  darkest,  bleakest,  most  try- 
ing epoch  in  Alabama's  story.  The  South  was  bankrupt  in 
treasury  and  in  spirit.  Its  commerce  and  industries  dwindled 
to  nothingness.     It  had  no  influence  in  national  affairs. 

Twenty-five  years  ago,  the  beginning  of  the  last  quarter  of 
a  century  of  the  life  of  the  institution,  law  and  order  were 
again  gradually  assuming  sway.  Honest  toil  was  earning  fair 
recompense,  and  men  became  sanguine  of  the  future.  At  this 
time,  1881,  Rutherford  B.  Hayes,  was  completing  his  single 
term  as  President  of  the  United  States.  The  declaration  of 
his  election  by  the  Electoral  Commission  was  fraud's  first  and 
only  triumph,  in  a  presidential  election,  in  American  history. 
I  regard  him  the  only  thoroughly  insignificant  personahty  that 
was  ever  in  power  in  the  White  House.  Weakling  as  he  was, 
however,  Mr.  Ha3^es  felt  kindly  to  the  Soutth,  and  invited  a 
southern  democrat  into  his  cabinet — Postmaster  General  Key. 
Mr.  Hayes'  southern  policy,  though  it  has  been  generally  pro- 
nounced a  failure,  loosed  the  bonds  that  bound  the  liberties 
and  opportunities  of  southern  men.  His  policy  was  the  enter- 
ing wedge  which  split  wide  open  the  yoke  on  the  necks  of  the 
southern  people.  Then  began  the  era  of  prosperity  and  happi- 
ness for  the  South,  which  has  lasted  until  this  very  hour,  ex- 


University  Bulletin'.  47 

cept  for  a  few  years  when  business  interests  were  paralyzed 
by  a  world-wide  financial  panic  in  the  year  1893. 

Alost  briefly,  of  necessity,  have  I  run  over  the  occurrences 
during  the  years  of  the  existence  of  the  University  of  Alabama. 
They  were  full  of  sunshine  and  storm,  of  lights  and  shadows, 
of  periods  of  war  and  trial  and  periods  of  peace  and  plenty.  I 
have  done  this  in  order  to  accentuate  the  glorious  part  that 
the  alumni  of  the  University  of  Alabama  have  always  played 
"in  all  kinds  of  weather."  In  prosperity  and  in  poverty,  in 
happiness  and  in  sorrow,  in  war  and  in  peace,  the  alumni  of 
the  University  of  Alabama  have  illustrated  the  genuine  manli- 
ness, which  makes  the  southern  gentleman  the  highest  type 
of  civilized  man.  The  forces  of  the  University  have  always 
been  dedicated  to  the  progress  of  trade  and  manufacture  and 
all  the  arts  of  life  and  the  practice  of  nobility  and  patriotism. 
Time  forbids  any  attempt  to  pay  tribute  to  the  many  distin- 
guished and  patriotic  men  who  learned  or  taught  wisdom 
within  these  walls.  I  speak  the  language  of  humility  when  I 
declare  the  University  of  Alabaam  need  not  fear  comparison 
with  other  universities. 

The  retrospect  is  eloquent  with  accomplishments,  and  the 
prospect  is  full  of  golden  promise. 

Why  should  not  the  next  twenty-five  years  of  the  Univer- 
sity of  Alabama  excel  in  all  respects  everything  accomplished 
in  the  past?  With  a  strong  and  harmonious  organization; 
with  a  faculty  notable  for  scholarship,  loyalty  and  zeal ;  with  an 
alumni  association  aroused  to  the  importance  of  every  factor 
that  will  promote  the  welfare  of  their  alma  mater ;  with  the 
people  of  Alabama  exhibiting  confidence  in  the  administration 
of  its  affairs  to  a  degree  never  exhibited  before ;  and  with  the 
press  pledged  in  every  way  to  lend  its  influence  to  strengthen, 
broaden  and  enlarge  the  plant  and  the  exercise  of  all  function?, 
pertaining  to  the  student  body  and  to  the  public,  why  should 
not  the  achievements  of  the  University  of  Alabama  be  as  salu- 
tary and  brilliant,  as  its  most  sanguine  well  wisher  can  picture 
or  desire? 

There  is  a  responsibility  upon  the  University,  and  upon  every 
other  institution  of  learning,  and  upon  every  newspaper,  which 
is  alike  and  common.  It  is  a  responsibility  which  should  not 
and  cannot  be  dodged.  The  same  obligation  rests  upon  every 
parent  and  upon  every  pulpit.     It  has  always  been  an  obliga- 


48  University  Bulletin. 

tion  upon  every  good  citizen  of  this  country,  but  more  partic- 
ularly now  than  ever  before.  It  is,  that  every  boy  and  girl 
and  every  man  and  woman  must  be  made  to  know  and  deeply 
appreciate  enough  concerning  the  genius  of  American  institu- 
tions to  realize,  at  least,  that  this  is  a  popular  representative 
government ;  that  every  citizen  is  a  sovereign ;  that  every  citi- 
zen should  be  intelligent,  virtuous  and  courageous ;  that  every 
man  who  holds  office — legislative,  executive  or  judicial — is  ac- 
countable to  his  fellow  citizens — the  servant,  not  the  master, 
of  the  people.  The  man  who  enjoys  the  confidence  of  the  peo- 
ple and  is  commissioned  by  them,  in  any  position  of  honor  or 
emolument,  must  be  held  to  constant  and  rigid  recognition  of 
the  fact  that  he  is  the  servant  of  the  people,  that  he  must  ren- 
der honest,  efficient,  loyal  service  to  their  will.  The  man, 
clothed  with  such  honor,  who  hesitates  to  hew  to  the  line,  is 
lost.  The  man  who  doubts  as  to  his  duty,  whether  to  the  peo- 
ple or  some  selfish  interest,  should  certainly  be  damned.  The 
man,  who  is  faithless  to  his  pledges  and  the  spirit  of  American 
institutions,  is  a  traitor  to  his  party  and  his  country,  should  be 
branded  and  made  an  outcast.  That  "public  office  is  a  public 
trust"  should  be  taught  every  child  in  the  nursery,  and  iterated 
and  re-iterated  to  him  or  her  in  the  school  house  and  the  uni- 
versity, by  the  pulpit  and  by  the  press. 

May  I  be  permitted,  in  conclusion,  to  quote  from  that  dis- 
tinguished man  of  letters,  Thomas  Babington  Macauley,  on  the 
occasion  of  an  address  by  him  at  the  400th  anniversary  of  the 
University  of  Glasgow,  who  expresses  what  I  want  to  say  bet- 
ter than  I  can  ? 

"May  the  historian  of  the  future  be  able  to  boast  that  the 
next  century  of  the  University  has  been  more  glorious  than 
the  last.  He  will  be  able,  I  am  sure,  to  vindicate  that  boast 
by  citing  the  long  list  of  eminent  men,  great  masters  of  experi- 
mental sciences,  of  ancient  learning,  of  native  eloquence,  orna- 
ments of  the  senate,  the  pulpit  and  the  bar.  He  will,  I  hope, 
mention  with  high  honors,  some  of  my  young  friends  who  now 
hear  me ;  and  he  will,  I  hope,  also  be  able  to  add  that  their 
talents  and  learning  were  not  wasted  on  selfish  or  ignoble  ob- 
jects, but  were  employed  to  promote  the  physical  and  moral 
good  of  their  species,  to  extend  the  empire  of  man  over  the  ma- 
terial world,  to  defend  the  cause  of  civil  and  religious  liberty 


University  Bulletin.  49 

against  tyrants  and  bigots,  and  to  defend  the  cause  of  virtue 
and  order  against  the  enemies  of  all  divine  and  human  laws." 
I  again  thank  you,  Mr.  President,  for  the  honor  you  have 
done  me.  So  long  as  I  shall  live,  I  shall  take  a  pronounced  in- 
terest in  the  welfare  and  fame  of  the  University  of  Alabama. 


DELEGATES,  GREETINGS  AND  CONGRATU- 
LATIONS. 

These  Institutions  were  officially  represented  at  the  Cele- 
bation,  as  follows : 

Alabama  Girls  Industrial  School — J.  A.  Moore,  Montevallo, 
Alabama. 

Alabama  Normal  College — Julia  Strudwick  Tutwiler,  Liv- 
ingston, Alabama. 

Alabama  Polytechnic  Institute — Charles  Coleman  Thach, 
Auburn,  Alabama. 

Brown  University — William  Herbert  Perry  Faunce,  Provi- 
dence, Rhode  Island. 

Central  University — F.  L.  Blaney,  Danville,  Kentucky. 

Cornell  University — Eugene  R.  Corson,  Savannah,  Georgia. 

Grant  University — Charles  Rountree  Evans,  Chattanooga, 
Tennessee. 

Johns  Hopkins  University — James  Curtis  Ballagh,  Balti- 
more, Maryland. 

Iowa  State  College — Charles  Allen  Cary,  Auburn,  Alabama. 

Marietta  College — John  Herbert  Phillips,  Birmingham,  Ala- 
bama. 

Marion  Military  Institute — James  Thomas  Murfee,  Marion, 
Alabama. 

Mount  Holyoke  College — Emilie  N.  Martin,  Montreat, 
North  Carolina. 

Oberlin  College — John  M.  P.  Metcalf,  Talladega,  Alabama. 

South  Carolina  College — Francis  Horton  Colcock,  Columbia, 
South  Carolina. 

Tulane  University — Joseph  Nettles  Ivey,  New  Orleans, 
Louisiana. 

Union  College — George  Rainsford  Fairbanks,  Fernandina, 
Florida. 

United  States  Military  Academy — William  P.  Duvall,  At- 
lanta, Georgia. 

University  of  California — Thomas  Walker  Page,  Berkeley, 
California. 


University  Bulletin.  51 

University  of  Georgia — Robert  Emory  Park,  Jr.,  Athens, 
Georgia. 

University  of  Mississippi — Robert  Burwell  Fulton,  Oxford, 
Mississippi. 

University  of  North  CaroHna — Francis  Preston  Venable, 
Chapel  Hill,  North  Carolina. 

University  of  Pennsylvania — Josiah  Harmar  Penniman, 
Philadelphia,  Pennsylvania. 

University  of  the  South — William  B.  Hall,  Sewanee,  Ten- 
nessee. 

University  of  Tennessee — Brown  Ayres,  Knoxville,  Tennes- 
see. 

University  of  Virginia — Charles  William  Kent,  Charlottes- 
ville, Virginia. 

University  of  Wisconsin — Charles  Rountree  Evans,  Chatta- 
nooga, Tennessee. 

Virginia  Polytechnic  Institute — Ellison  Adger  Smyth,  Jr.. 
Blacksburg,  Virginia. 

Washington  University — Winfield  Scott  Chaplin,  St.  Louis, 
Missouri. 

Washington  and  Lee  University —  Frank  Sims  Moody,  Tus- 
caloosa, Alabama. 

Yale  University — George  Frederick  Peter,  Maylene,  Ala- 
bama. 


SPECIAL  GREETINGS  TO  THE  UNIVERSITY  OF 
ALABAMA. 


Cornell  University. 
Presented  by  Dr.  Eugene  R.  Corson. 


To  the  University  of  Alabama,  renowned  among  the  uni- 
versities of  the  South,  upon  the  auspicious  occasion  of  the  cele- 
bration of  the  seventy-fifth  anniversary  of  her  inauguration, 
Cornell  University  sends  greeting  and  sincere  congratulations. 

In  the  method  of  the  founding  of  her  noble  schools,  whose 
first  wealth  accrued  to  them  through  the  sale  of  public  lands, 
in  the  large  and  genial  spirit  of  her  installation  upon  non- 
sectarian  lines,  in  her  sturdy  maintenance  of  the  highest  ideals 
of  scholarship  and  citizenship,  Cornell  University  recognizes  in 
the  University  of  Alabama  an  elder  sister. 

From  the  difficulties  of  pioneering  in  a  new  and  undevel- 
oped region,  from  the  later  vicissitudes  of  war  when  her  scho- 
lastic edifices  and  her  cherished  library  were  reduced  to  ashes, 
she  has  risen  more  glorious  than  ever  and  has  turned  to  fresh 
vistas  of  prosperity. 

The  University  has  advanced,  and  will  advance,  in  material 
welfare  with  the  industrial  progress  of  the  State,  but  amidst 
this  success  she  has  not  lost  sight  of  her  duty  as  a  spiritual  and 
intellectual  guide.  Her  contributions  to  learning  in  the  past 
and  the  development  of  character  within  her  walls  bespeak  for 
her  a  beneficent  future.  For  the  realization  of  such  a  future, 
Cornell  University  sends  her  fervent  good  wishes,  and  has  com- 
missioned one  of  her  most  worthy  sons,  Dr.  Eugene  Corson,  of 
Savannah,  Georgia,  to  convey  them  to  the  University  of  Ala- 
bama upon  this  happy  occasion. 

J.  G.  Schurmann, 

(Seal.)  President. 

Wm.  A.  Hammond, 
Secretary  of  the  University  Faculty. 
Ithaca,  New  York,  May  4,  1906. 


Grant  University. 
Presented  by  Major  Charles  R.  Evans. 


GREETING: 

By  these  letters  and  through  its  accredited  representative  and 
member  of  its  faculty, 

CHARLES  ROUNTREE  EVANS, 

THE  GRANT  UNIVERSITY 

extends  to 

THE  UNIVERSITY  OF  ALABAMA 

hearty   congratulations   upon   the   auspicious   occasion   of  the 
Seventy-fifth  anniversary  of  its  formal  opening. 

Engaged  in  the  great  work  of  seeking  truth,  disseminating 
knowledge,  directing  man  towards  right  reason  and  right 
living,  the  Grant  University  is  mindful  of  the  enlightened  ser- 
vice the  University  of  Alabama  has  done  and  is  now  doing 
along  these  lines  of  human  endeavor,  and  appreciates  and  fore- 
sees a  splendid  growth  and  enlarged  opportunities  for  this,  the 
highest  institution  of  learning  in  a  great  and  famous  State  of 
our  country. 

May  prosperity  attend  the  University  of  Alabama  and  cor- 
diality of  feeling  continue  and  intimacy  increase  between  our 
two  institutions  working  together  for  all  those  things  that 
make  men  better. 

In  testimony  whereof,  there  is  set  hereunto  the  seal  of  the 
Grant  University  and  the  hand  of  its  president. 

(Seal.)  James  H.  Race. 


United  States  Military  Academy. 
Presented  by  Brigadier  General  William  P.  Duvall,  U.  S.  A. 

I  am  sure  we  all  meet  on  a  common  ground  and  interest  in 
education  and  progress  whether  we  happen  to  be  apprenticed 
to  letters  or  to  the  sword,  whether  our  calling  is  to  the  mart  or 
the  temple.  Whatever  our  cloth, — or  whether  we  have  none, 
but  belong  to  the  great  new  world  of  enterprise  not  known  as 
professional — each  of  us  has  his  allegiance  to  his  own  Alma 
Mater  but  none  the  less  a  sympathetic  regard  for  that  of  each 
of  the  rest  of  us. 

I  should  feel  greatly  honored  in  being  asked  to  represent 
the  United  States  Military  Academy  upon  any  occasion,  but 
peculiarly  so  at  this  auspicious  time  when  the  University  is 
celebrating  the  completion  of  her  three-quarters  of  a  century 
of  P_!nlightenment  and  Mentorship. 

West  Point  greets  Alabama  and  congratulates  her  upon  her 
years  and  her  achievements ;  and  thanks  her  heartily  for  the 
friendship  which  prompted  this  invitation  to  join  in  her  re- 
joicing. 


University  of  Wisconsin. 
Presented  by  Major  Charles  R.  Evans. 


GREETING : 

By  these  letters  and  through  its  accredited  representative  and 
alumnus,  Charles  Rountree  Evans, 

THE  UNIVERSITY  OF  WISCONSIN 

extends  to 
THE  UNIVERSITY  OF  ALABAMA 

hearty  congratulations  upon  the  celebration  of  the   Seventy- 
fifth  Anniversary  of  its  formal  opening. 

While  every  institution  of  the  higher  learning  may  well  re- 
joice in  the  growth  and  prosperity  of  its  sisters  there  exists  be- 
tween the  State  universities  a  peculiar  bond  of  sympathy  aris- 
ing out  of  their  like  relations  to  their  respective  communities 
and  the  similar  service  which  it  is  their  duty  and  privilege  to 
render.  Standing  as  the  official  custodians  of  the  higher  intel- 
lectual  interests  of  the  State,  they  are  charged  not  only  with  im- 
parting useful  knowledge  to  the  youth  who  seek  their  halls 
but  also  with  the  wider  dissemination  of  that  knowledge  to 
every  class  of  the  community  and  to  its  continued  augmenta- 
tion through  creative  study  and  research.  They  stand  for  ser- 
vice to  the  whole  community  along  every  line  of  intellectual 
effort. 

Mindful  of  a  worthy  past,  the  University  of  Wisconsin  felici- 
tates The  University  of  Alabama  upon  her  enlarging  oppor- 
tunities and  looks  with  confidence  to  her  future,  anticipating 
an  ever  increasing  measure  of  usefulness  along  lines  broadly 
planned  and  nobly  executed.  May  prosperity  and  wealth  of 
service  rendered  be  attended  by  continued  cordiality  of  feeling 
and  by  increased  intimacy  of  relationship  between  the  two  in- 
stitutions whose  commonwealths  under  one  meridian  mark  the 
confines  of  the  land. 

In  token  whereof  there  is  set  hereunto  the  seal  of  the  Uni- 
versity of  Wisconsin  and  the  hand  of  its  President. 

Charles  R.  Van  Hise. 

(Seal.) 


Yale  University. 


PRAESES,  SOCII,  PRAECEPTORES 

UNI  VERS  ITATIS  YALENSIS 

PRAESIbl,    CURATORIBUS,    PROFESSORIBUS 

ALABAMENvSTS  UNIVERSITATIS 
S.  P.  D. 

Vobis,  viri  doctissimi  atque  humanissimi,  cum  Academia 
vestra  per  haec  lustra  quindecim  magna  cum  felicitate  floruit, 
ex  animo  gratulamur  sperarrusque  fore  ut  Lampada  Liti-era- 
rum  Sapientiaeque  quasi  cursores  semper  felicissime  feratis 
aliisque  tradatis. 

Quod  nos  vobis  natalem  vcstrae  Universitatis  septua-j^esimum 
quintum  celebraturis  adesse  vultis,  nobis  pergratum  est,  Con- 
cives  enim  Reipublicae  Artium  Scientiarumque,  qui  isto  modo 
inter  Se  gaudent,  quadam  vitae  coniunctione  mutuisque  exhor- 
tationibus  ad  amorem  cum  suorum  studiorum  tum  patriae 
generisque  humani  incitantur.  Alumnum  igitur  nostrum, 
Gulielmum  Irvin  Grubb,  delegimus  qui  gratulationes  votaquc 
nostra  vobis  praesens  offerat.  Quod  bonum  faurtum  feltx 
fortunatumque  sit ! 

Arthur  Twining  Hadley, 

Praeses. 

D.  Novo  Portu  Connecticutensium,  a.  d.  VI  Kal.  Apriles, 
MCMVI. 


ALUMNI  DAY:     TUESDAY. 

9:00  A.  M. 

Business  Meeting  of  the  Society  of  the  Alumni. 

10:30  A.  M. 

Music. 

Prayer. 

Presentation  of  the  Portrait  of  the  Honorable  Tennant  Lomax, 

of  the  Class  of  1878,  to  the  University,  by  the 

Society  of  the  Alumni. 

Presentation  Address — Hon.  Phares  Coleman,  Class  of  1883. 

Acceptance  on  the  Part  of  the  University, 
Hon.  Hubert  Trevellyn  Davis,  Class  of  1882. 

Music. 

11   A.   M. 

Annual  Oration  before  the  Society  of  the  Alumni, 

Hon.  Charles  A.  Towne,  Member  of  Congress  from  the 

Fourteenth  District  of  New  York. 

Music. 

1:00  p.  M. 

Alumni  Banquet. 


8:oo  p.   M. 

ALUMNI  DlvBATE. 

Music. 
Prayer. 


58  University  Bulletin, 

Question  for  Debate. 

Resolved,  That  the  Old  Times  were  Better  than  the  New. 

Affirmative — Warfield    Creath     Richardson,      1843,      of     the 

Erosophic  Society. 

Negative — Russell  P.  Coleman,  1902,  of  the  Philomathic 

Society. 

Alusic. 

Affirmative — George  Little,  1855,  of  the  Philomathic  Society, 

(in  place  of  Charles  Edward  McCall,  1885,  of  the 

Erosophic    Society.) 

Negative — Chappell  Cory,  I878,  of  the  Philomathic  Society. 

Music. 
Decision  by  the  Judges. 


It  is  regretted  that  the  Presentation  Address  by  Phares 
Coleman,  the  Acceptance  Address  by  Hubert  Trevellyn  Da- 
vis, and  the  Annual  Oration  before  the  Society  of  the  Alumni 
by  Hon.  Charles  A.  Towne  have  not  been  available  for  this 
record  of  the  celebration. 


CELEBRATION  DEBATE. 


Question — Which  arc  better:     The  Old  Times  or  the  Nezu? 

First  Speech  for  the  Affirmative, 

By  JVarficld  Creath  Richardson,   1843. 


Laudator  temporis  acti, 
Castigator,  censorque  minorum. 

— Horace,  Ars  Poetica. 


'Tis  a  far  cry  to  the  time  when  I  enrolled  myself  a  mem1:)er 
of  the  Erosophic  Society — 67  years  ago.  The  incidents  of  that 
occasion  are  vibrant  at  this  hour.  I  see  the  grave,  the  dignified 
assemblage.  I  see  the  gleam  of  conscious  statesmanship  that 
lights  up  every  countenance.  I  see  our  noble  President,  his 
brow  stamped  with  care  and  responsibility,  seize  the  impressive 
gavel.  I  see  the  tutelary  Goddess  of  Liberty,  from  a  gorgeous 
canvas,  look  down  in  approval  upon  our  weighty  deliberations. 
I  hear  the  stormy  outbursts  of  eloquence.  I  catch  the  muffled 
plaudits. 

The  Rotunda,  however,  was  the  place  for  speaking.  The  ceil- 
ing of  that  classic  pile  was  arched  overhead  like  the  dome  of 
a  vast  reverbatory  furnace,  and  I  tell  you,  it  made  the  voice 
roll  and  resound  and  re-echo.  We  could  speak  there  in  a 
rotund  voice,  and  I  suppose  that  is  the  reason  it  was  called 
the  Rotunda.  Anyhow,  you  had  to  speak — speak  in  spite  of 
yourself,  and  the  echoes  kept  on  speaking  after  you  got 
througl>.  Well  do  I  remember,  it  was  there  I  first  formed 
the  acquaintance  of  Caesar,  Brutus  and  Antony,  whom  I  of- 
ten invoked  as  "Friends,  Romans,  Countrymen."  You  see, 
we  had  "Come  down  from  a  former  generation."  We  had 
"Only  one  lamp  by  which  our  feet  were  guided,  and  that  wa.-? 
the  lamp  of  experience."    How  many  times  we  there  "Wi'  Wal- 


60  University  Bulletin. 

lace  bled,"  how  many  times  we  fought  for  our  "Altars  and 
our  firesides,"  no  comptometer  could  enumerate.  Sometimes 
we  got  stuck.  I  suppose  the  stucco  had  something  to  do  with 
that,  but  the  frieze  and  the  pilasters  were  a  great  inspiration. 
When  we  lost  our  cue,  we  eloquently  pointed  a  finger  at  the 
acanthus  ornament  on  the  top  of  the  Corinthian  column,  and 
by  the  time  the  audience  got  through  staring  at  that,  we  had 
recovered  from  the  shock,  and  were  bowling  along  like  an 
auto.  Daniel  Webster  once  said,  that  "Eloquence  must  exist 
in  the  man,  in  the  subject,  in  the  occasion,"  but  I  still  think  the 
Corinthian  columns  have  something  to  do  with  it.  He  also 
said,  "It  cannot  be  brought  from  far."  He  had  never  heard 
us  speak,  else  he  would  have  admitted,  that  some  of  our  elo- 
quence was  rather  far-fetched.  He  learned  to  speak  in  old 
Fanueil  Hall — no  thanks  to  him — most  anybody  could  speak 
off-hand  in  the  "Cradle  of  Liberty."  Henry  Clay  learned  to 
speak  in  the  Senate  chamber  of  the  United  States,  and  lived 
to  be  called  "The  great  Commoner,"  but  Daniel  Webster  was 
certainly  the  great  Uncommoner. 

I  am  an  old  man.  I  suppose  it  is  because  I  am  an  old  man 
that  this  part  has  been  assigned  me.  I  cannot  help  being  old ; 
I  am  not  old  from  choice.  Like  Topsy  I  just  "growed  so."  My 
decreptitude  is  humiliating.  I  absurdly  blundered  along  from 
day  to  day,  till  now  in  the  evening  of  life,  I  blush  to  discover 
that  I  am  old.  I  apologize  for  it.  I  would  deny  it,  but  it  is 
in  the  Bible.  I  foolishly  welcomed  every  day  that  came.  Ev- 
ery day  brought  a  new  landscape,  a  new  point  of  view,  a  new^ 
horizon.  I  reasoned,  what  if  you  do  grow  old — haply  you  may 
grow  wise.  What  if  you  do  grow  old — peradventure  you  may 
grow  mellow.  What  though  your  footsteps  totter,  your  head 
be  silvered — the  badge  of  the  seer,  the  insignia  of  the  pro- 
phet! 

But  you  say,  the  New  Times  are  better,  that  youth  is  bet- 
ter. Then  let  me  reverse  life,  grow  backward.  Let  me  un- 
wind the  web — revolve  the  scroll  from  age  to  manhood, 
from  manhood  to  youth,  from  youth  to  boyhood,  from  boy- 
hood to  infancy.  Ha,  what  a  rush  of  divine  ichor  through  my 
veins !  I  fling  aside  my  staff,  my  crutch,  my  glasses.  How  de- 
lightful !  The  Fountain  of  Youth,  the  caldron  of  Medea !  But 
stop !  you  are  emptying  my  store  of  knowledge,  my  urn  of  ex- 


University  Bulletin.  61 

perience.  My  reverence  is  going,  my  humility — the  whole  spir- 
itual man  is  gone.  Soon  the  intellectual  will  follow  and  the 
animal  alone  remain.  I  am  descending  from  maturity  to  crud- 
ity, from  strength  to  weakness,  from  refinement  to  barbarism — 
absolutely  from  light  to  darkness.  How  dreadful  the  con- 
templation, how  awful  the  reality! 

Which  are  better,  the  Old  Times  or  the  New?  What  is 
first  is  better,  what  is  tried  is  better,  what  is  time-honored  is 
better.  In  the  olden  time  men  grew  to  the  age  of  Methuselah, 
grew  to  the  statute  of  Goliath,  grew  to  the  wisdom  of  Solomon. 
grew  to  the  strength  of  Sampson.    While  Pan  reigned  we  could 

"Sport  with  Amaryllis  in  the  shade, 
Or  with  the  tangles  of  Neaera's  hair." 

"Have  sight  of  Proteus  rising  from  the   sea, 
And  hear  old  Triton  blow  his  wreathed  horn." 

Before  Calchas  died,  we  could  hurl  the  lance  of  Ajax,  we 
could  bend  the  bow  of  Ulysses.  The  Old  Times  were  full  of 
charm,  full  of  enchantment,  full  of  poetry.  Mystery  is  a 
halo  that  enlarges,  that  elevates,  that  transfigures.  Mystery 
gave  a  glamour  to  ancient  letters  unknown  to  modern.  When 
imagination  and  mystery  let  go  an  object,  it  ceases  to  draw,  it 
rushes  to  commonplace,  it  rushes  to  oblivion.  If  I  knew  who 
named  the  star  Aldebaran,  why  it  was  called  Aldebaran,  when 
it  was  called  Aldebaran,  where  it  was  called  Aldebaran — I 
would  trample  Aldebaran  under  my  feet.  Christ  knew  that 
mere  facts  could  not  engage  a  hearer,  so  he  spake  in  parables. 
Take  the  Prodigal  Son.  A  certain  man — what  man  ?  Had 
two  sons — what  sons?  The  younger — what  younger?  Went 
to  a  far  country — what  country?  Wasted  his  substance — what 
substance?  Joined  himself  to  a  citizen  of  that  country — what 
citizen?  No  particulars,  no  details,  no  name.  Had  this  story 
been  literally  and  circumstantially  related,  like  a  gossip's  tale 
it  had  gone  into  one  ear  and  out  at  another;  but  in  the  hands 
of  the  Master,  it  was  a  fact  generalized,  its  limitations  taken 
off — a  sublime,  a  radiant  truth,  crowned  with  the  halo  of  illu- 
sion, so  that  it  became  as  wide  as  space  and  a?  enduring  as 
time. 


62  University  Bulletin. 

There  is  an  adage  that  says,  "Old  friends  are  better,  Old  wine 
is  better."  In  distress,  in  trouble  to  whom  do  you  apply  ?  To 
the  summer  friend — no.  You  want  your  father's  friend,  your 
mother's  friend,  the  old  friend.  He  may  be  in  China — send 
for  him.  He  may  be  dead — go  visit  his  grave,  and  ask  your- 
self what  he  would  advise  if  he  were  here.  You  will  not  apply 
for  help  to  a  stranger — no.     You  say  the  old  friend  is  better. 

Your  nerves  are  shattered,  prostration  from  a  strenuous  life. 
You  descend  into  a  cellar,  miles  and  miles  in  an  underground 
passage.  Tlie  dust  flies  in  your  face — no  matter,  the  cobwebs 
cumber  your  feet — no  matter,  thousand  of  shining  bottles  lie 
invitingly  around,  but  you  speed  on  and  on,  and  thrusting  your 
arm  deep  down  into  a  murky  alcove  you  bring  up  a  flask  from 
its  very  depths,  and  holding  it  up  rejoicingly  to  the  light,  you 
exclaim,  the  old  wine  is  better.  Old  friends,  in  the  old  wine, 
from  this  Barmecide  cup,  I  drink  to  you  tonight. 

The  Old  Times,  the  old  things  are  better.  Of  their  class, 
often  they  are  the  only  things.  Lear  apostrophized  the  firma- 
ment of  old.  Why  the  sun,  the  moon,  the  stars  are  old.  God 
is  old,  Christ  is  old — old  as  the  Word,  old  as  the  Beginning. 
All  things  that  are  essential,  are  old — all  things  that  are  indis- 
pensable are  old.  The  virtues  are  old — hoary  with  age.  No 
new  ones  are  ever  invented,  discovered  or  created.  Things 
have  to  grow  old  in  order  to  mature.  No  experience  is  trust- 
worthy till  it  is  stricken  in  years.  No  system,  no  creed,  no  pol- 
icy can  challenge  admiration  till  time  has  approved  and  set  its 
seal  upon  it.  The  very  attributes  of  age,  as  majesty,  sublimity, 
venerableness,  attest  its  superiority.  When  Cataline  threatened 
to  dismember  Rome,  Sallust  could  find  no  language  strong 
enough  with  which  to  denounce  the  madness  and  folly  of  his 
partisans,  than  to  say,  Vetera  odere,  nova  exoptanf.  The  lust  of 
the  New  is  at  the  bottom  of  all  discontent,  all  revolt,  all  conspi- 
racy, all  revolution.  What  is  new  is  presumably  bad.  It  has  no 
record,  no  history — it  can  have  no  character.  New  is  mushroom, 
upstart,  undigested,  unproved,  untried,  callow.  A  novelty  ,a 
fad — it   is   insignificant. 

The  ancients  were  the  pioneers,  the  discoverers,  the  authors 
— we,  the  imitators.  Originality  belongs  to  the  past,  "There  is 
nothing  new  under  the  sun,"  said  Solomon.  Even  before  his 
day  the  world  had  been  exhausted — the  stock  of  ideas  had  been 
exhausted.    The  best  we  can  do  is  to  charge  our  mental  kaleid- 


University  Bulletin.  63 

oscope  with  the  thoughts  of  all  ages,  give  the  instrument  a  turn 
and  report  the  new  combinations.  We  thresh  over  the  same  old 
chaff,  we  dig  up  the  same  old  nuggets.  We  combine,  revamp, 
furnish,  veneer,  and  we  call  it  invention.  Morse  did  not  invent 
the  telegraph.  Watt  the  steam  engine,  not  Marconi  the  'Wire- 
less.' They  copied,  they  added,  they  imitated,  they  adapted. 
The  man  who  floated  the  first  leaf  made  navigation  possible. 
The  man  who  blazed  the  first  tiail  was  the  precursor  of  civili- 
zation. The  man  who  first  turned  over  a  stone  with  his  staff 
invented  the  lever  and  was  greater  than  Archimedes.  The  man 
who  first  traced  with  his  finger  a  furrow  in  the  sand  invented 
the  plow,  and  was  greater  than  Trystolemus.  The  man  who 
invented  the  screw,  the  continuous  wedge,  was  greater  than 
Ericsson.  The  man  who  invented  the  wheel,  the  infinite  lever, 
was  greater  than  all  the  inventors  that  ever  lived.  Modern 
inventors  copy  their  predecessors,  or  draw  their  hints  from 
nature,  but  in  all  the  vast  universe  God  nowhere  hoists  with  a 
screw,  nor  plies  the  wheel  in  locomotion.  These  ancient  inven- 
tions, the  unaided  devices  of  primitive  man's  ingenuity,  made 
all  progress  possible  and  remodelled  the  world. 

You  cannot  vaunt  superiority  by  reason  of  greater  complex- 
ity, cost,  finish  or  amount  of  power  in  modern  invention,  for 
remember  it  was  not  the  ancient  task  to  refine  gold  but  to  ex- 
tract gold  at  all;  not  to  diversify  crops,  but  to  crop  at  all;  net 
to  weave  on  a  Jacquard  loom  but  to  weave  at  all ;  not  to 
spin  a  thread  that  would  rival  the  silk-worm's  gossamer,  but 
to  spin  at  all.  What  seems  crude  to  you  in  ancient  knowledge 
was  best  at  the  time,  best  under  the  circumstances,  best  for 
earth's'  existing  occupants.  If  that  invention  be  incomplete 
that  falls  below  requirement,  the  invention  clearly  is  futile  that 
transcends  requirement.  There  was  a  time  when  Hiero's  en- 
gine was  best,  when  the  Ptolemaic  system  was  best,  when  the 
tribal  system  was  best,  when  monarchy  was  best.  The  sword 
of  today  is  no  better  for  us  than  the  obsidian  hatchet  for  the 
man  of' the  Stone  age.  Adam  could  not  have  guided  a  gang- 
plow,  nor  Noah  have  navigated  a  seven-ton  liner. 

The  ancients  laid  the  foundation  of  every  modern  science. 
Before  Newton,  Ovid  had  described  the  rainbow.  Before 
Copernicus,  Pythagoras,  the  solar  system.  So  early  did  they 
come  in,  the  Greek  ascribed  the  horse  to  Neptune,  the  olive 
to  Juno.    The  fifth  moon  of  Jupiter  may  be  new,  but  astronomy 


64  University  Bulletin. 

is  not  new.  The  Roentgen  rays  may  be  new,  but  optics  is  not 
new.  The  "Recessional"  by  Kipling  may  be  new,  but  what 
about  the  Odyssey,  what  about  the  Iliad?  The  forty-niners  may 
be  new,  but  what  about  Colchis  and  the  Golden  Fleece?  With  a 
thin  veneer  of  aluminum  the  moderns  have  only  capped  a  monu- 
ment that  was  ages  in  the  building — have  only  chiselled  the  apex 
of  a  pyramid  whose  massive  volume  is  hid  in  the  rriists  of 
antiquity. 

I  look  for  patriotism,  intrepidity  and  all  the  nigged  virtues 
in  the  earlier  stages  of  a  nation's  history.  Before  the  dictator- 
ship of  Sulla,  the  Romans  were  simple,  frugal.  When  fighting 
for  their  fields,  their  temples  and  their  firesides,  they  were  unit- 
ed, loyal,  religious ;  but  when  the  last  enemy  had  fallen,  when 
Carthage  was  destroyed,  and  the  whole  world  rang  with  her  tri- 
umphs— Rome  turned  the  sword  upon  her  own  vitals.  Greed, 
rapine  flourished — corruption,  rapacity  reigned.  From  the 
noblest,  she  became  the  basest  of  states.  It  is  a  mistake  to  sup- 
pose that  libertines,  profligates,  traitors  are  the  spawn  of  bar- 
barism— they  are  the  swart  offspring  of  civilization.  Sensuali- 
ty, sacrilege,  sedition  belong  to  an  intelligent  era.  They  are 
not  the  hairy  monsters  bred  by  darkness  and  moisture — they 
are  the  maggots  hatched  by  the  sun. 

Education  was  better  in  the  olden  time.  It  made  a  symmetri- 
cal man,  an  all-round  man.  It  did  not  develop  the  feet  at  the 
expense  of  the  head,  nor  the  body  at  the  expense  of  the  mind. 
It  taught  men  to  reason  as  well  as  to  speculate,  to  speak  and 
write  as  well  as  to  think,  and  best  of  all — it  sometimes  sand- 
witched  a  moral  between  the  lenten  crusts.  Great  minds  are 
made  so  by  observation,  by  meditation,  by  study,  but  research 
is  largely  a  thing  of  the  past.  You  moderns  rely  upon  others 
to  observe,  to  cogitate,  to  draw  conclusions.  You  can  tell  us 
what  Cicero  thought,  what  Seneca  thought,  what  Plato  thought, 
but  you  cannot  tell  us  what  you  think  yourselves.  Unlike  tht- 
ancients,  you  have  nowhere  the  stimulus  of  curiosity,  reverence, 
peril  or  novelty.  The  very  rainbow  is  snatched  from  the  cloud, 
and  shown  to  be  a  twisted  cord  of  seven  colors.  You  are  not 
encouraged  or  permitted  to  find  out  anything  for  yourselves. 
You  may  dispense  with  the  universe — you  learn  everything 
from  a  book.  The  animals  are  driven  into  a  book  and  ye  call 
it  Zoolog\^  The  sands  and  clay  are  shovelled  into  a  book  and 
you  call  it  Geology.    The  moon  and  stars  are  jumbled  together 


University  Bulletin.  65 

into  a  book  and  you  call  it  Astronomy.  You  rig  up  a  long  tube 
with  spectacle  glasses,  and  you  say — behold  the  moons  of  Ju- 
piter. You  put  a  pint  of  water  into  a  saucepan,  and  you  say 
this  is  hydrostatics.  You  pour  it  upon  the  floor  and  you  say  this 
is  hydraulics.  You  are  in  doubt  whether  water  runs  up  hill  or 
down,  but  it  is  in  the  book.  You  say  twice  two  is  four,  the 
teacher  stands  by  to  applaud,  gives  you  a  ten,  and  sends  a  bulle- 
tin to  the  parent  to  inform  him  what  a  remarkable  son  he  has. 
The  dictionary  spells  all  your  words,  the  encyclopedia  supplies 
all  your  facts.  You  ring  a  big  bell  for  the  preacher  to  come  to 
the  temple  to  teach  you  the  Golden  Rule,  and — ten  to  one — 
you  go  off  and  distort  it  into 

"Do  unto  others" — as  they  do  unto  you. 

Brought  into  the  world  without  knowledge  or  consent,  tided 
over  pain  and  sickness  with  anaesthetics,  you  are  dismissed 
from  life  as  from  a  Chinese  theatre  its  scenes  unscanned,  its 
characters  unstudied. 

But  why  prolong  the  hour  in  trivial  discourse?  You  cannot 
compare  the  New  things  with  Old  for  the  New  is  not  tixed,  not 
stable.  It  is  shifting,  provisional — only  here  on  good  behavior, 
only  here  on  trial.  The  next  breath  may  Sweep  the  mist- 
wreath  away.  The  French  republic  is  on  trial,  the  Monroe  doc- 
trine is  on  trial,  American  colonization  is  on  trial,  Cuba  is  on 
trial.  The  Hague  is  on  trial,  the  Douma  is  on  trial — in  fact 
all  modernity  is  on  trial. 

The  outlook  of  your  modern  era  is  not  flattering.  Force  and 
cunning  govern  the  world.  Even  in  America,  politics  is  be- 
coming graft,  liberty  license,  business  niiilitarism,  a  vote  a 
commodity.  Lawlessness  is  in  some  places  prevalent,  unrest 
is  in  all  places  dominant.  You  talk  of  the  Parliament  of  man. 
and  flourish  "the  big  stick."  You  call  meetings  of  the  Hague, 
the  Algiceras,  and  keep  on  building  battleships.  You  sing.  "I 
want  to  be  an  angel,"  with  one  hand  in  a  brother's  pocket.  You 
print  Bibles  to  convert  the  heathen,  and  export  dynamite  and 
nitroglycerine  to  blow  him  to  kingdom-come.  In  the  name  of 
Jehovah.  T  cw  you  halt!  There  are  breakers  ahead  which  it 
would  be  wisdom  to  avoid.  The  strike  question,  the  trust  ques- 
tion, the  immigration  question,  the  tariff  question,  the  Philippine 
question,  the  Chinese  question  vibrate  like  the  snakes  on  Me- 

6 


66  University  Bulletin. 

dusa's  head,  and  will  not  down  at  your  bidding.  Your  leaders 
are  gone — the  men  who  furnished  virtue,  as  well  as  brains, 
for  the  conduct  of  public  affairs,  have  stepped  down  and  out. 
The  civic  virtues  are  giving  way.  Anarchy  lifts  her  bloody  head. 
Hear  the  tocsin — 'tis  history  that  sounds  the  alarm — 

"First  wealth,  then  power,  then  corruption." 

No  nation  is  exempt, — your  own  not  excepted.  The  first 
two  conditions  are  already  here — the  third  is  knocking  at  the 
door. 

The  South,  the  patient,  the  long  suffering  South  has  made 
and  is  making  a  great  struggle  to  preserve  her  civilization. 
She  has  kept  her  proud  escutcheon  unsullied  to  this  hour.  No 
graft,  no  perfidy  has  yet  invaded  her  threshold,  and  may  God 
keep  back  the  tide  of  infamy.  With  the  tiara  of  innocence  en- 
circling her  brow,  with  the  hallowed  recollection  of  her  glo- 
rious past  clasped  to  her  bosom,  if  sink  she  must  in  the  vortex 
of  corruption  that  threatens  to  engulf  our  common  country, 
may  she  be  the  last  to  go  down,  and  as  Caesar,  buffeting  the 
stormy  sea,  bore  his  precious  tablets  above  the  roaring  waves, 
may  she — even  in  death — with  arm  uplifted,  triumphantly  up- 
hold the  high-born  charter  of  her  liberties,  untainted  and  un- 
stained, above  the  raging  flood. 


First  Speech  eor  the  Negative. 


Russell  Porter  Coleman,  1897. 


Mr.  Cfwirman,  Ladies  and  Gentlemen  and  Fellow  Alumni  of 
the  University : — 
It  is  somewhat  difficult  to  try  to  discuss,  in  the  short  space 
of  fifteen  minutes,  a  subject  so  long  and  ancient  that  it  reaches 
back  to  the  Garden  of  Eden,  so  broad  and  modern  that  it  comes 
down  to  the  College  Commencements  of  1906.    And  yet,  may 


UnIVERSITV:-  BULLETIN.  67 

we  not  say  a  small  portion  of  this  fifteen  minutes  is  sufficient 
time  in  which  to  convince  any  reflective  mind  that  "The  old 
times  were  NOT  better  than  the  new." 

We  concede  there  has  been  a  great,  good  and  glorious  past — 
a  past  replete  with  brave  men,  noble  deeds  and  beautiful  women. 
We  bow,  and  bare  our  heads  in  reverence  to  the  great  ones  of 
that  past,  whose  lives  adorn  the  pages  of  history ;  but  Heaven 
forbid  that  we,  as  a  people,  should  ever  reach  the  point  of  sim- 
ple, childlike  seniority  which  lives  only  in  the  past. 

We  think  it  eminently  fitting  and,  indeed,  a  happy  arrange- 
ment of  the  speakers,  that  those  v/ho  represent  the  affirmative 
side  should  be  chosen  from  the  "old  time"  towns  of  Tuscaloosa 
and  Butler,  while  those  who  represent  the  negative  side  are 
chosen  from  the  modern,  up-to-date  Birmingham,  and  the  only 
other  town  in  the  State  like  Birmingham,  which  is  Dothan. 
The  towns  represented  by  the  respective  sides  are  living  ex- 
amples of  each  side's  contention. 

In  the  first  place,  let  us  ask — What  is  "good  times?"  Isn't 
it  the  opposite  of  bad  times' — of  hard  times?  Isn't  it  the  siun 
total  of  good  things  and  the  condition  of  things ;  such  as 
wealth,  knowledge,  law,  morality,  convenience  and  Christian- 
ity? Now,  in  order  to  prove  our  side  of  the  question,  it  is 
not  necessaiy  to  show  that  all  things  are  better  than  they  were 
before,  but  only  to  show  that  more  are  better  than  are  worse. 
When  were  they  ever  better  than  they  are  to-day  ? 

This  is  pre-eminently  an  age  of  progress.  The  very  voice 
of  nature  is,  and  has  ever  been,  onward  and  upward'!  From 
the  beginning  of  time's  record  man  has  pressed  forward  with  a 
fixed  purpose,  and  tho'  often  cast  down  by  temporary  defeats 
und  disasters,  he  has  always  risen  with  renewed  strength  and 
courage  for  the  battles  of  life.  Short  periods  of  time  like  that 
of  the  "Dark  Ages"  may  have  impeded  progress  temporarily, 
but  the  general  average  and  the  grand  total  have  always  shown 
great  gain,  and  in  every  age,  struggling  humanity,  like  Long- 
fellow's youth  in  the  Alpine  Village, 

Through  rain  and  storm  and  snow  and  ice. 
Has  borne  the  banner  with  the  strange  device, 

'Excelsior.' 


68  University  Bulletin. 

The  theory  of  evolution  is  no  longer  doubted  by  learned  nic^n, 
and  that  is  nothing  but  progress.  Therefore,  to-day  is  better 
than  yesterday.  The  fundamental  idea  of  evolution  is  that  the 
present  is  the  child  of  the  past  and  the  parent  of  the  future ;  or 
that  the  creatures  which  we  see  around  us'  are  descended  frf)ni 
simpler  ancestral  forms,  and  that  these  ancestors  were  descend- 
ed from  still  simpler  forms,  and  so  on  backward  till  the  scien- 
tific imagination  loses  itself  in  the  midst  of  life's  beginnings'. 

In  all  animate  nature,  there  is  a  great  tendency  to  rapid  in- 
crease, which  comes  in  conflict  with  the  increase  of  their  means 
of  subsistence  or  even  with  the  limitations  of  space.  Then  comes 
the  struggle  for  existence  in  which  the  fittest  always'  survive. 
Not  only  is  this  true  with  respect  to  animate  nature,  but  evolu- 
tion is  a  law  whose  operation  can  be  traced  throughout  every 
department  of  nature.  It  is  equally  well  illustrated  in  the  his- 
tory of  philosophy,  in  the  arts,  in  society,  in  commerce,  in  wor- 
ship, in  civilization. 

The  great  fortunes  of  former  times  compared  with  the  mam- 
moth fortunes  of  to-day  would  be  as  the  "widow's  mite." 
Those  few  fortunes  too,  were  amassed  in  most  cases  by  laying 
tribute  on  the  people  and  were  usually  found  in  the  palace  of  the 
king.  They  were  never  used  for  the  benevolent  purposes  of 
endowing  colleges,  collecting  libraries,  establishing  institutions 
for  the  poor  and  unfortunate,  rebuilding  stricken  cities,  or  to 
feed  and  clothe  the  unfortunate  victims  of  earthquake,  fire  and 
flood.  Such  are  the  noble  uses  to  which  the  great  wealth  of 
to-day  is  being  put.  I  know  the  pessimistic  calamity  howler 
will  tell  you  that  the  rich  are  getting  richer  and  the  poor  are 
getting  poorer,  but  that  is  only  half  true,  and  therefore,  we  say 
let  him  prove  his  statement!  Is  it  not  disproved  by  the  busy 
hum  of  spindles,  the  rumbling  wheels  of  commerce,  the  merry 
whistled  tune  of  the  plowman,  the  sweet  song  of  the  milkmaid, 
the  bright  face  and  quickened  step  of  the  workman  everywhere  ? 
And  if  you  want  further  proof,  go  ask  the  poor  man  to  show 
you  the  deed  to  his  little  cottage  home,  his  snug  little  bank  ac- 
count, and,  in  the  farming  districts,  ask  him  to  show  you  that 
iron-bound  mortgage,  which  for  years  and  years  the  rich  man 
held  upon  his  home,  now  "lifted,"  "taken  up,"  "cancelled." 
The  tenant  has  ceased  to  board  with  the  landlord  and  is  nov»- 
living  at  home. 


Univejrsity  Bulletin.  69 

Once  upon  a  time  one  of  England's  Sweetest  poets  returned 
to  the  village  of  his  youth  and  found  it  deserted  by  all  that  was 
near  and  dear  to  him.  The  land  had  been  taken  by  the  King 
and  converted  into  parks  and  gardens  for  the  diversion  of  him- 
self and  his  princes  and  lords.  Saddened  at  the  sight  which 
met  his  gaze,  poor  Oliver  Goldsmith  broke  out  in  these  words : 

111  fares  the  land  to  hastening  ills  a  prey, 
Where  wealth  accumulates  and  men  decay. 

Prmces  and  lords  may  liourish  or  may  fade, 

A  breath  can  make  them,  as  a  breath  has  made ; 

But  a  bold  peasantry,  the  country's  pride, 
When  once  destroyed,  can  never  be  supplied. 

Such  was  a  picture  of  wealth  and  power  m  the  "olden  tmies," 
but  where  to-day,  is  the  land  a  prey  to  such  hastening  ills'^ 
Wealth  has  accumulated  and  is  accumulating,  but  not  at  the 
decay  of  men.  No  king  to-day  with  his  princes  and  lords  can 
convert  the  land  into  parks  and  gardens  for  their  own  gratifi- 
cation. Why  is  this  ?  Because  each  age  adds  to  the  possibility 
of  the  next,  and  progressive  man  takes  advantage  thereof. 
Our  laws  are  better,  our  morals  are  better,  our  institutions 
are  better  than  those  of  "old  times."  Our  ancestors  were  among 
the  deserters  of  those  old  English  villages,  who  came  to  this 
Country  to  establish  and  did  establish  a  more  righteous  form  of 
government.  Wherever  and  whenever  time  has  suggested  an 
improvement  in  that  form  of  government,  it  has  been  made. 
And  yet,  we  wonder  why  we  are  so  slow  to  break  away  from  the 
old  English  ideas  and  customs.  The  king  had  divine  origin  and 
could  do  no  wrong.  What  an  array  of  crimes  and  what  a  mul- 
titude of  sms  were  suffered  by  the  "old  time"  people  under  this 
delusion.  He  was  a  turk  in  his  harem,  a  tyrant  on  his  throne 
and  a  monarch  everywhere.  What  applied  to  the  king  in  a  less 
degree,  applied  to  a  lord  or  baron ;  and,  in  America,  applied  to 
the  land  owner  of  Virginia,  and  the  aristocrat  of  Boston.  So 
slow  were  we  to  lay  aside  these  ignorant,  erroneous  ideas,  that 
we  have  to  be  several  generations  removed  from  them  before 
we  are  able  to  look  back  upon  their  folly.  In  the  last  decade 
of  the  17th  Century  nineteen  persons  were  burned  at  the  stake 
as  witches,  almost  in  the  shadow  of  learned  Boston,  the  Hub  of 
the  Universe.    And  the  authority  for  their  persecution  and  con- 


70  University  Bulletin. 

demnation  was  a  book  on  the  subject  of  witchery,  written  by 
Rev.  Cotton  Mather,  the  greatest  American  scholar  at  thai 
time.  Oh !  the  mockery  of  justice  in  determining  the  guilt  of 
these  supposed  witches.  It  was  httle  removed  from  the  old 
English  "Ordeals." 

Let  us  look  for  a  moment  at  the  conveniences  of  the  "old 
time"  man  and  compare  them  with  the  present.  Now  the  gen- 
tlemen on  the  other  side  will  admit  that  the  constant  work  of 
science,  art,  discovery  and  invention  has  placed  continuous 
rounds  in  the  ladder  of  progress  until  we  have  to-day  conven- 
iences in  the  home,  in  travel,  in  commerce,  in  business,  in 
church,  in  school,  in  everything,  that  were  never  dreamed  of 
by  them  of  "old  times."  Yes,  they  admit  this,  but  they  say  we 
were  better  off  without  these  things.  They  say  we  lived  better, 
we  lived  longer,  we  lived  happier,  we  did  more  for  the  world, 
for  God  and  our  fellowman  when  we  were  ignorant  of  the  many 
things  which,  to-day,  add  to  the  comfort  and  convenience  of 
mankind.  That's  what  they  say.  Do  they  believe  and  can 
they  prove  it?  Let  us  make  it  a  personal  question.  If  our 
present  state  of  progress  is  not  good,  the  burden  is  upon  the 
other  side  to  say  to  what  point  we  shall  descend  the  ladder  and 
find  ideal  time.  If  the  whole  of  progress  is  bad,  then  any  part 
thereof  is  bad,  and,  therefore,  we  must  descend  to  the  bottom 
and  live  with  man  in  his  primeval  state.  Would  my  friend, 
Prof.  Richardson,  leave  his  palatial  home  in  the  "beautiful 
city  of  oaks"  and  go  back  to  nature?  Would  he  burn  that  beau- 
tiful library,  destroy  that  fine  furniture,  throw  away  the  brus- 
sels  carpet,  tear  down  the  lace  curtains,  cut  out  the  lights, 
the  water,  the  'phone,  the  bath-room,  burn  his  automobile,  dyna- 
mite the  railways,  street  cars,  telegraphs,  churches,  parks  and 
schools ;  reduce  the  city  to  ashes,  let  the  "green  grass  grow  all 
'round"  and  take  up  his  abode  with  Adam  and  fig  leaves?  Oh ! 
wouldn't  he  pause  at  the  foot  of  that  ladder,  and  like  the  prod- 
igal son,  "come  to  himself?"  Yes,  I  see  him  gazing  up  the 
misty  height  through  which  he  has  fallen,  and  as  he  gazes, 
he  catches  a  faint  sound  of  a  sweet  Philomathic  song,  sung  by 
Dothan  and  Birmingham  : — 

"I  am  climbing  high  and  higher. 
Don't  you  grieve  after  me." 


University  Bulletin.  71 

He  arises  and  says:  "I  will  go  to  Birmingham — I  will  con- 
fess my  sins  and  ask  to  be  as  one  of  the  hired  servants  in  the 
house  of  my  friend,  Chappell  Cory." 

By  nature  and  action  the  eternal  God  is  progressive.  Any 
other  view  of  His  plan,  would  be  to  pronounce  Him  a  failure. 
The  christian  religion  is  spreading  to  the  remotest  part  of  the 
earth ;  we  are  ceasing  to  worship  idols ;  we  no  longer  burn 
human  beings  for  supposed  witchery ;  ignorance  is  reducing  lo 
a  minimum ;  superstition  is  becoming  a  thing  of  the  past ;  there 
is  voluntary  reverence  for  the  laws  of  God  and  forced  obe- 
dience to  the  laws  of  man. 

The  Pharisees  complained  that  Christ's  laws  were  too  strin- 
gent and  quoted  to  him  the  Mosaic  law  on  the  same  subject. 
In  reply  the  Savior  said :  "Because  of  the  hardness  of  your 
hearts,  Moses  suffered  you  to  do  these  things,  but  from  the  be- 
ginning it  was  not  so."  Again,  Paul,  comparing  the  times  of 
Moses  with  the  times  of  Christ,  said :  "If  any  man  think  he 
knoweth  anything,  he  knoweth  nothing,  for  we  know  in  part  and 
we  prophesy  in  part,  but  when  that  which  is  perfect  is  come, 
then  that  which  is  in  part  shall  be  dene  away.  When  I  was  a 
child  I  spake  as  a  child,  I  understood  as  a  child,  I  reasoned  as 
a  child,  but  when  I  became  a  man,  I  put  away  childish  things, 
for  now  we  see  through  a  glass  darkly,  but  then  face  to  face." 
Thus  we  see  that  both  Paul  and  the  Savior  declare  the  prin- 
ciples of  progress  in  the  spiritual  world,  by  showing  that  spir- 
itual blessings  and  spiritual  duties  are  commensurate  with  our 
age  and  ability  to  comprehend  and  utilize  them. 

At  one  stage  of  progress  the  preaching  of  Jonas  and  the 
wisdom  of  Solomon  was  sufficient  for  man,  "but  now,"  sa>s 
Paul,  "a  greater  preacher  than  Jonas,  and  a  wiser  teacher  than 
Solomon  is  here."  Again  we  had  the  forerunner,  John,  a  great 
and  good  man  who  preached  repentance  and  baptized  with 
water,  but  following  him  there  came  One,  "the  latchet  of  whose 
shoes  John  was  not  worthy  to  unloose,"  and  who  preached  sal- 
vation and  baptized  with  the  Holy  Ghost. 

The  peaceful  termination  of  the  Russo-Japanese  war,  the  pro- 
posed disarmament  of  the  world,  the  international  peace  com- 
mission, and  arbitration  committees  throughout  the  land,  all 
go  to  show  that  we  are  approaching  the  time  when  swords  shall 
beat  into  plow  shares  and  spears  into  running  hooks ;  when  na- 
tion shall  cease  to  lift  up  sword  against  nation,  neither  shall 


72  University  Bulletin. 

they  learn  war  any  more.  Such  has  been  the  progressive  nature 
and  action  of  the  Eternal  God — fulfilling  the  Scripture:  "The 
earth  shall  be  as  full  of  his  knowledge  and  power  as  the  waters 
that  coyer  the  sea." 

Then,  Gentlemen,  if  good  times  means  good  things  and  v/e 
have  more  of  them  to-day,  and  better,  than  we  ever  had  before ; 
if  the  theory  of  evolution  is  true;  if  it  means  endless  progres- 
sion and  its  operation  can  be  traced  throughout  every  depart- 
ment of  nature;  if  man  must  either  progress  or  retrograde  and 
you  believe  he  has  progressed ;  if  each  age  adds  to  the  possi- 
bilities of  the  next  and  progressive  man  has  taken  advantage 
thereof;  if,  in  the  struggle  for  existence,  the  fittest  always  sur- 
vive and  the  very  voice  of  nature  is  onward  and  upward ;  if 
the  gentlemen  on  the  other  side  who  are  "out  of  joint  with  the 
present  times,"  fail  to  designate  a  point  down  the  ladder  of  pro- 
gress where  ideal  times  may  be  found ;  if  they  refuse  to  give 
up  the  comforts  of  to-day  for  the  abode  of  Adam  and  fig  leaves ; 
if  the  wealth  of  today  is  held  by  individuals  subject  to  the  drafts 
of  philanthropy  and  is  spent  to  rebuild  stricken  cities  and  to 
feed  and  clothe  the  victims  of  earthquake,  fire  and  flood, 
while  the  wealth  of  former  times  was  held  by  the  king  and  used 
to  oppress  the  poor  and  gratify  the  whims  of  royalty;  if  by 
nature  and  action  the  eternal  God  is  progressive;  if  we  have 
ceased  to  be  babes  in  Christ  and  have  put  away  childish  things : 
if,  through  the  ages,  one  increasing  purpose  runs  and  the 
thoughts  of  men  are  widened  with  the  process  of  the  suns ; — 
then  we  think  we  may  fairly  conclude  as  we  began,  and  say, 
the  old  times  were  not  better  than  the  new. 


Second  Speech  I'Or  the  Affirmative. 


George  Little,  1855. 


In  the  absence  of  Mr.  Charles  Edward  McCall,  Dr.  George 
Little,  class  of  1855,  presented  the  second  speech  for  the  Afiir- 
mative.  Owing  to  the  few  hours'  notice  for  preparation,  this 
speech  was  not  put  into  manuscript,  and  could  not  be  reproduced 
for  this  record. 


University  Bulletin.  73 

Second  Speech  for  the  Negative. 


CJmppell  Cory,  1879. 


It  has  been  a  great  pleasure  for  us  to  vlisit  the  old  times 
in  company  with  our  beloved  and  venerated  friend,  Prof. 
Richardson.  If  the  opposition  has  a  ground  to  stand  on,  it 
is  in  the  fact  that  the  good  old  days  did  produce  a  class  of  men 
of  which  he  is  so  splendid  and  dear  a  type. 

Respect  for  the  wisdom  and  emulation  of  the  virtues 
of  our  forefathers  are  necessary  if  we  would  profit  by  the 
one  or  improve  upon  the  other.  The  contention  of  this  affir- 
mative would  bring  us  down  to  ancestor  worship  just  as  the  na- 
tions which  have  suffered  most  from  the  blight  of  that  baneful 
religion  are  throwing  it  away. 

My  distinguished  colleague  has  brought  us  down  the  long 
road  traveled  by  mankind  and  shown  how  the  way  has 
smoothed  and  widened  underneath  the  flowing  years.  Mine 
is  the  pleasant  task  of  pointing  you  to  a  living  witness — 
a  witness  living  and  breathing  before  our  eyes  in  the  swelling 
happiness  and  freshening  beauty  of  Alabama. 

Who  would  exchange  this  University  for  the  University 
of  the  old  times?  A  proud  yesterday?  Yes!  But  a  glorious 
today ! 

Who  would  compare  the  scattered  academies  of  the  old 
times  with  the  thickening  school  houses  of  the  new  ?  Ed- 
ucation free  for  everybody  is  leveling  up  the  people.  It  lias 
pulled  no  man  down. 

We  must  not  take  the  lordly  mansions  of  tlve  fortunate 
few  as  the  standard  of  goodness  or  happiness  or  vvcllbeing 
in  Alabama  before  the  war.  This  was  essentially  a  land  of 
cabins,  for  white  as  well  as  black. 

The  transformation  of  our  great  pine  belt  to  the  south- 
ward from  a  sparsely  settled  no-man's-land  of  illiterates 
and  poverty  to  its  present  proud  position,  more  than  offsets  all 
that  all  of  us  ever  lost  by  war.  We  point  you  to  the  long  de- 
spised wire  grass   section  of  Alabama  as  a   prosperous  and 


74  University  Bulletin. 

grand  rebuke  to  the  pessimism  which  conceived  this  Subject 
as  open  for  discussion. 

The  barefoot  man  in  the  mountain  and  the  woman  with 
the  mountain  tooth  brush  in  her  mouth,  counted  for  as  much  to 
drag  the  average  down  as  the  owner  of  a  hundred  slaves  to 
bring  the  average  up.  In  these  glad  new  times  the  "Poor  White 
Trash"  are  disappearing  fast,  and  that  degrading  phrase  will 
soon  be  lost  to  our  vocabulary.  They  are  being  swallowed  up 
by  the  public  schools  and  lost  amid  the  bustling  ranks  of  our 
multitudinous  wage  earners. 

In  these  glad  new  times  the  whole  machinery  of  government 
and  society  with  its  upward  Sweep  are  organized  to  lift  the  low- 
ly. For  the  indigent  sick  hospitals  are  usurping  the  ancient 
function  of  the  poor  house.  We  place  stepping  stones  before 
the  feet  of  every  child,  and  even  for  our  juvenile  jail  birds  we 
have  industrial  schools  instead  of  stripes. 

We  are  rid  of  slavery  the  wide  world  over.  That  was  not 
a  crime.  It  was  not  even  a  sin.  But  it  was  for  us  in  Alabama 
a  night  whose  moonbeams  held  promise  of  a  blood  red  dawn. 

Let  me  focus  the  splendid  argument  of  my  colleague  in  the 
illustration  of  a  single  instance.  The  impulse  is  strong  within 
us  to  help  the  tallow  faced  boys  and  gum  chewing  girls  who 
work  in  our  cotton  factories.  Mr.  Chairman,  you  have  said  in 
that  profound  egotism  of  superior  wisdom  which  afflicts  all  of 
us  who  sit  in  cushioned  chairs :  "These  people  were  better  ofif 
where  they  were.  They  should  have  stayed  there."  Gen- 
tlemen of  the  Committee,  where  were  they?  They  were  where 
the  good  old  times  placed  them,  and  sought  to  keep  them,  and 
would  have  fastened  them  down  forever  if  they  could.  Whole 
armies  have  come  marching  out  of  the  Egypt  of  the  old  times 
straight  into  the  factory  villages  of  the  new,  and  they  like  it. 
Other  armies  are  waiting  the  chance  to  come. 

You  might  say  the  bird  and  the  butterfly  are  better  off 
where  you  have  caged  them.  Open  their  prison  door, 
and  they  fly  straight  toward  the  sunshine  and  the  flowers. 
They  know !  What  are  you  going  to  say  for  the  times  that 
produced  and  held  down  some  millions  of  people  to  whom  even 
the  modern  cotton  mill  is  both  flowers  and  sunshine?  These 
people  know  !    The  better  churches  and  better  schools,  the  mon- 


University  Bulletin.  75 

ey  wag-c,  the  better  food  and  better  clothing,  and  above  all, 
human  sympathy  that  reaches  them  in  the  life,  beckon  to  theni 
and  they  come. 

Amid  the  very  worst  the  glad  new  times  have  to  offer,  the 
very  cheapest  and  meanest  of  its  businesses  is  displacing  the 
dull  and  hopeless  stare  of  the  old  days  with  the  dawn  of  hope 
and  the  glow  of  opportunity.  The  dirt  eating  "Poor  White 
Trash"  was  a  dirt  eater  till  he  died.  Many  a  tallow  faced 
factory  boy  of  today  will  seize  the  opportunities  of  these  g\^d 
new  times  and  be  a  factory  superintendent  in  the  still  gladder 
tomorrow. 

The  standard  of  our  public  life  in  Alabama  bears  out  my 
colleague  in  his  argument  that  morals  are  better.  In  these  glad 
new  times  our  worst  scandals  are  the  petty  shortages  of  a  county 
official  here  and  there.  Read  the  history  of  the  bank  scandals 
in  the  very  heyday  of  the  good  old  times,  and  learn  how  leading 
men  achieved  bank  directorates  through  politics  and  sold  loans 
of  the  people's  money  for  a  price. 

Read  the  classic  story  of  Simon  Suggs  and  other  stories  of 
that  era,  and  you  will  grow  suspicious  lest  some  of  us  in  this 
very  hall  have  inherited  lands  from  good  forefathers  who  ob- 
tained them  from  the  helpless  Indians  by  methods  that  make 
the  shaving  of  the  equally  helpless  negro  by  our  modern  trades- 
men and  landlords  and  lawyers  look  like  common  honesty. 

Let  me  further  support  my  colleague  with  the  most  joyous 
instance  of  them  all — the  happier  fate  of  woman  in  the  glad  new 
times.  There  were  princesses  here  in  Alabama  in  the  good 
old  days — grand  dames  matchless  the  wide  world  over,  and  in 
the  time  of  stress  they  turned  heroine,  every  one.  My  young 
friends  of  the  Philomathic  Society,  the  girls  with  whom  you 
make  merry  on  these  classic  grounds  are  just  as  lovely  and 
just  as  noble  and  just  as  ready  to  turn  heroine  as  the  sweet- 
hearts with  whom  your  grandfathers  walked  in  these  same 
places  half  a  century  ago.  Don't  you  believe  it?  And  they 
are  better  educated. 

The  transition  from  the  old  to  the  new  brought  some  cultured 
women  low  in  the  scale  of  this  world's  goods.  But  how  few 
they  were,  when  all  is  told,  compared  with  the  whole  body  of 
the  women  of  Alabama  whom  the  glad  new  times  have  lifted 
up !  They  have  built  a  society  just  as  cultured  as  the  old,  and 
vastly  better,  for  it  has  a  creed  of  public  usefulness  whose  cardi- 


76  UNivjutsiTY  Bulletin. 

nal  doctrine  is  helpfulness  for  the  helpless.  Our  women  of 
wealth  are  just  as  true  and  loyal  ornaments  of  the  parlor  and 
the  home,  while  their  activities  have  widened  until  their  gentle 
arms  are  felt  underneath  every  human  thing  in  need  of  human 
help. 

All  our  women,  high  and  low,  are  revelling  in  the  sunshine 
of  their  new  opportunities.  The  poor  girl  of  the  old  times  was 
a  drudge,  a  sewing  woman,  or  ate  her  heart  out  in  dependence 
on  some  unwilling  relative.  Now  a  hundred  avenues  are  open 
to  her,  and  for  almost  every  girl  who  works,  some  mother's 
heart  is  lighter,  some  cupboard  is  less  bare,  some  home  the 
brighter. 

It  is  true,  and  the  ladies  will  bear  me  out,  that  in  these  glad 
new  times  there  is  a  most  indubitable  and  growing  scarcity 
of  cooks.  Why?  In  the  rising  prosperity  of  the  people,  man 
after  man  has  improved  into  the  wish  for  a  home,  and  finding 
himself  able  to  support  one,  has  taken  his  wife  away  from  your 
cook  pot  to  boil  the  cabbage  in  his  own.  A  plentiful  supply  of 
domestic  servants  is  evidence  of  a  still  more  abundant  supply 
of  the  very,  very  poor.  Their  growing  scarcity  is  a  silver  bell 
announcing  their  emergence  from  the  doom  of  scrubdom. 

We  hear  that  the  glad  new  times  are  afflicted  with  a  scarcity 
of  labor,  and  that  industry  suffers.  Not  so.  The  glad  new 
times  are  blessed  with  a  superabundance  of  employment.  Pros- 
perity and  a  plentiful  labor  supply  are  impossible  of  conjunc- 
tion. When  the  overplus  is  on  the  side  of  labor,  the  standard 
of  comfort  is  lowered,  some  men  go  hungry,  some  homes  feel 
the  pinch  of  want.  When  the  overplus  is  on  the  side  of  employ- 
ment, everybody  except  the  vagrant  is  astir.  The  whole  land 
is  vibrant  with  the  music  of  glad  tidings,  the  building  of  new 
churches,  the  rattle  of  new  wheels.  Every  home  has  a  new 
picture  on  the  wall,  and  a  new  hope  for  the  children  as  a  guest 
around  its  fireplace. 

We  have  been  so  long  bemoaning  the  lost  beatitudes  of  the 
happy  handful,  that  some  of  us,  I  fear,  have  impiously  forgot- 
ten to  thank  God  for  the  woncierful  new  standard  of  wages 
and  comfort  and  aspiration  that  blesses  the  unnumbered  mil- 
lions of  the  people. 

Time  admonishes  that  I  must  close,  and  I  summon  to  the 
argument  of  my  colleague  the  supreme  blessing  of  civilization 
and  the  only  guarantee  of  liberty.    In  the  good  old  times  there 


University  Bulletin.  77 

was  only  one  vital  question  before  the  people,  and  the  laws  of 
the  land  forbade  its  discussion  except  in  the  affirmative.  Foi- 
twenty  years  after  war  had  cut  that  subject  down  and  out, 
public  opnion,  stronger  than  statute  law,  forbade  criticism  of 
the  dominant  party  and  its  progressively  evil  methods. 

After  awhile,  the  Press  began  to  break  the  shackles  and  free 
speech  to  trickle  through  lips  long  sealed.  Its  first  great  fruits 
are  seen  in  the  new  constitution  with  its  primary  election  and 
the  growing  necessity  for  joint  discussion  among  the  aspirant.^ 
for  office.  Its  suppress:ion  left  no  way  out  of  the  impossible  old 
times  except  through  blood  and  tears.  The  glad  new  times  are 
bulwarked  in  the  new  freedom  of  men  and  women  to  discus.^ 
what  they  please,  and  to  take  whichever  side  they  please  on 
every  subject  beneath  the  sun. 

Freedom  of  speech  here  in  Alabama  at  last,  and  a  great  peo- 
ple are  marching  upward  as  well  as  onward !  Freedom  of 
Speech  is  civilization's  crowning  diadem.  Let  no  man  under- 
take again  to  s'teal  it  from  our  brows  and  hide  it  in  his  pocket. 


COMMENCEMENT  DAY:     WEDNESDAY. 


Music University   March. 

Prayer. 

Music — Poet  and   Peasant Suppe 

Orations   by   Seniors. 

(Contest  for  Trustees'  Prize.) 

Oscar  Paleman  McGraw Popular  Election  of  Senators. 

Edward  Kirby  Chambers Our  Alma  Mater. 

James  Mallory  Kidd Our  Imperial  Colonial  Policy. 

Music — Trovatore    (Selection) Verdi. 

Report  of  Committee  on  Award. 

Music. 

CfxSbration   Oration. 

Francis   P.  Venable,   Ph.  D.,  President  of  University  of 
North  Carolina. 

Music. 

The  Conferring  of  Degrees  by  the  President. 

Music — Lohengrin  Overture Wagner. 

Benediction. 

Music — "Home,  Sweet  Home.*' 


University  BuLLEn.'iN.  79 

Ce:li;bration  Oration 


By  Presidijnt  Francis  Preston  Venable^  University 
OF  North  Carolina. 


The  Responsibility  of  the  College-bred  Man. 

Your  University,  with  its  inspiring  record  of  high  achieve- 
ment, celebrates  to-day  its  seventy-fifth  anniversary.  I  bring 
the  cordial  greetings  of  an  older  sister. 

Seventy-five  years  in  tl>e  history  of  a  young  and  growing 
countr}-  is  a  long  period  and  covers  much  of  change  and  devel- 
opment. In  the  life  oi  an  individual  it  marks  the  rise,  the 
zenith,  the  decline  of  powers  and  the  swiftly  approaching  limit 
of  usefulness.  But  the  life  of  such  an  institution  as  this  knows 
no  such  cycle  of  change.  The  growth  at  first  is  apt  to  be  slow 
but  with  the  years  come  increased  strength  and  efficiency  and 
capacity  for  service.  Age  brings  only  the  conservatism  of  his- 
toric associations,  the  grandeur  of  a  noble  service  and  the  glory 
of  high  ideals  exemplified  in  the  lives  of  generations  of  strong 
sons.  I  can  well  believe  it  that  since  the  historic  i8th  of  April 
seventy-five  years  ago,  when  the  doors  of  this  institution  were 
first  opened,  the  history  of  Alabama  has  been  largely  moulded 
by  the  men  who  found  their  training  and  their  inspiration  here, 

To  such  an  audience  as  this  and  on  such  an  occasion  there 
are  many  subjects,  pleasant  and  instructive,  about  which  I 
might  speak  but  the  thought  of  those  sons  of  the  University 
who,  in  the  past,  did  so  much  for  state  and  country,  and  of  the 
great  work  which  remains  to  be  done  for  our  beloved  South 
fills  my  heart  with  a  message  which  must  be  delivered  at  the 
risk  of  wearying  you  with  what  many  may  call  a  trite  and 
tiresome  sermon. 

Sons  of  the  University,  men  who  have  been  trained  in  tlic 
people's  school,  for  the  people's  service,  what  is  the  greatest 
gift  which  you  have  received  from  this  revered  mother,  wliat 
is  the  great  new  thought,  the  higher  creed  with  which  she  bas 
inspired  you  if  you  have  learned  your  lesson  aright? 


80  University  Bulletin. 

It  seems  to  me  that  licr  priceless  gift  is  the  awakening  to  a 
knowledge  of  the  truth  and  responsibility  for  it.  Unless  you 
realize  this,  your  training  will  fail  of  its  highest  aims'  and  your 
country  will  fail  of  the  full  return  which  it  has  a  right  to  expect 
from  the  investment  it  has  made  in  you.  I  wish  to  speak  to  you, 
therefore,  of  the  responsibilities  of  the  college  bred  man. 

I  appeal  to  no  narrow  sectionalism  when  I  plead  for  our 
beloved  South.  If  there  has  been  an  absorbing  passion  in  my 
life,  which  has  directed  most  of  my  labors,  it  has  been  the  de- 
sire to  see  this  home  land  of  ours  take  once  more  its  fitting 
position  of  power  and  influence  in  the  nation.  I  have  seen  it 
devastated  by  war  and  the  tragedy  of  that  desolation  and  humil- 
iation was  burned  in  me  as'  a  child.  I  have  seen  my  people 
ground  down  and  plundered  by  misgovernment.  I  have  been 
proud  of  their  heroic  patience  imder  misception,  calumny  and 
scorn.  I  pray  that  I  may  live  to  see  the  day  when  we  shall 
hold  our  own  in  all  worthy  aims  with  the  very  best  in  the  land. 
To  this  great  end  I  believe  it  imperatively  necessary  that  strong 
leaders  shall  be  trained  who  have  the  wisdom  to  see  the  truth 
and  the  courage  to  live  up  to  their  responsibilities  for  it. 

I  rejoice  in  the  growing  prosperity  of  the  South,  its  bountiful 
harvests,  multiplying  factories  and  rising  cities.  These  humming 
spindles  and  busy  marts  and  all  that  makes  for  material  devel- 
opment have  a  use  and  beauty  of  their  own.  They  are  good  but 
alone  they  have  little  to  do  with  the  true  greatness  of  a  man  or 
a  nation.  We  have  learned  to  ertimate  at  its  true  value  the 
guinea  that  gilds  the  forehead  of  the  fool,  and  the  pages  of 
history  give  the  inglorious  record  of  many  a  nation  whose  only 
boast  was  its  wealth. 

There  are  dangers  in  the  great  flood  of  gold  which  is  being- 
poured  into  the  lap  of  the  South.  It  is  apt  to  bring  confusion 
of  ideals  and  temptation  to  lower  attainments  and  lesser  accom- 
plishments. We  hear  much  of  the  wonderful  opportunities 
offered  by  the  growth  and  proS])erity  of  the  South  to  the  ambi- 
tious young  man.  To  my  mind  the  greatest  opportunity  is  that 
for  trained  and  wise  leadership.  Some  such  leaders  we  have. 
Many  more  are  needed.  The  call  is  an  insistant  one  for  strong 
men,  true  to  the  highest  ideals  and  their  duty  to  the  people. 

There  are  two  or  three  fundamental  propositions  which  we 
would  do  well  to  grasp,  desiring  to  be  a  free  and  great  people. 
The  first  is  that  real  freedom  comes  only  through  a  knowledge 


University  Bulletin.  81 

of  the  truth  and  by  following-  the  leading  of  the  kindly  star. 
"Ye  shall  know  the  truth  and  the  truth  shall  make  you  free." 

Men  have  always  longed  for,  striven  for  and  many  have  died 
for  freedom.  I  Tow  simply  and  clearly  the  one  possible  path 
to  it  is  pointed  out  in  that  grand  saying  of  the  one  free  man. 
Ignorant  manhood  is  of  necessity  manhood  under  bondage.  An 
ignorant  democracy  is  a  democracy  only  in  name  and  falls  an 
easy  prey  to  the  wiles  of  the  demagogue. 

A  people  who  would  be  free  must  see  clearly  the  truth  and 
follow  its  leading.  How  shall  they  see  the  truth  except  they 
be  taught  and  who  shall  teach  them  except  you  men  of  the 
schools  who,  in  such  quiet  halls  as  these,  have  drawn  in  the 
truth  as  the  inspiration  of  your  lives  and  feel  your  responsibil- 
ity for  it. 

Sometimes  in  the  history  of  a  people  one  man  arises  to  whom 
a  vision  of  the  truth  has  been  vouchsafed ;  one  man  against  a 
whole  nation  or  a  whole  world  that  is  ignorant  and  in  bonds  to 
the  false,  bowed  down  under  the  tyranny  of  wrong  and  un- 
truth. And  when  that  man  stands  and  speaks  boldly  for  the 
truth  in  the  face  of  all  prejudice  and  wrong  and  murderous  hate 
the  history  of  the  world  changes  for  with  the  eternal  truth  on 
his  side  he  is  in  the  majority. 

The  God-man,  facing-  his  Jev.'ish  accusers  and  all  the  power 
of  imperial  Rome,  as  typified  in  her  governor,  cried  out :  "To 
this  end  was  I  born  and  for  this  cause  came  I  into  the  world 
that  I  should  bear  witness  unto  the  truth."  Since  that  day  many 
have  grasped  the  great  fact  that  to  bear  witness  to  the  truth  is 
the  real  purpose  of  their  existence  and,  failing  in  that,  life  is  a 
paltry  thing  indeed.  It  is  pitiable  not  to  know  the  truth ;  it  is 
shameful  to  know  it  and  not  bear  witness  to  it. 

A  great  truth  had  been  borne  in  upon  the  soul  of  the  young 
graduate  of  the  University  of  Erfurt,  afterwards  monk  of  Wit- 
tenberg, and  though  church  anrl  state,  principalities  and  powers 
were  against  him  he  bore  witness  to  that  truth  before  the  as- 
sembled rulers  saying:  "Here  I  take  my  stand.  I  can  do  no 
otherwise.  So  help  me  God."  And  again  one  man  turned  the 
tide  of  history  and  changed  the  thought  and  culture  of  a  world. 

And  so  in  religion,  in  politics,  in  science,  in  every  phase  of 
human  belief  and  endeavor  a  cloud  of  witnesses  for  the  truth 
surround  us.     These  are  the  great  souls  of  the  world,  the  real 


82  University  Bulletin. 

heroes  rather  than  those  who  have  won  hero-worship  by  great 
slaughterings  or  tyrannies. 

Is  truth  worth  bearing  witness  to  or  making  such  sacrifices 
for?  "Vv'hat  is  truth"  is  the  ;"cornful  question  of  the  Roman 
governor  and  of  all  who  believe  in  mailed  power  and  force  as 
the  arbiter  of  right.  It  is  the  cry  of  greed  and  passion,  of  in- 
justice and  oppression  everywhere,  for  they  would  have  men 
faint  believing  that  there  is  no  truth — no  clear  shining  any- 
where, only  broken  lights  and  rampant  wrong.  But  there  is 
truth  for  him  who  searches  wisely  and  the  road  of  truth  is  made 
open  to  him  in  abodes  of  study  and  research  as  this. 

Benjamin  Kidd  has  said  that  England's  success  in  India  is 
due  to  the  influence  of  her  universities.  *'In  other  words,"  he 
says,  "it  is  the  best  and  most  distinctive  product  which  England 
can  give,  the  highest  ideals  and  standards  of  her  universities, 
which  is  made  to  feed  the  inner  life  from  which  the  British  ad- 
ministration of  India  proceeds." 

First  then  let  us  base  our  hopes  on  the  higher  ideals  of  col- 
lege life,  for  standards  and  ideals  are  the  guide  posts  on  the 
road  to  truth.  Dean  Briggs  of  Harvard  was  once  asked  to 
speak  on  the  temptations  of  college  life  and  consenting,  said 
that  he  would  speak  first  on  the  temptations  to  excellence. 
Among  these  temptations  to  excellence  are  to  be  classed  the 
higher  standards  and  ideals  which  prevail  among  the  honest, 
vigorous-minded,  unspoiled  youth  of  our  Universities. 

No  where  else  is  so  true  a  democracy  found.  Wealth  and 
such  external  conditions  have  far  less  weight  than  in  the  big 
world  outside  the  college  gates,  and  true  merit  is  far  more  gen- 
erally and  generously  recognized.  The  campus  verdict  on  teach- 
er or  fellow-student  is  apt  to  be  sound  at  heart  and  just.  The 
jury  is  made  up  of  buoyant,  hopeful  youths,  looking  out  on  life 
as  a  fair  and  promising  field  for  their  prowess  with  little 
thought  of  failure.  When  men  have  battled  on  this  field  and 
been  overthrown,  their  judgment  is  most  apt  to  be  colored  and 
confused  by  the  bitterness  or  disappointment  of  the  injustice 
from  which  they  have  suffered. 

For  four  years  or  more  the  college  boy  lives  a  life  that  is 
set  apart  from  the  fierce  struggle  for  wealth,  position,  power 
or  for  bare  existence.  The  talcs  of  the  heroic  past  fill  him 
with  enthusiasm ;  the  true,  the  beautiful,  the  good  in  literature, 
philosophy  and   art   leave   their  impressions   upon   his   plastic 


University  Bullettin.  83 

mind.  With  growing  reverence  he  studies  in  nature  the  handi- 
work of  the  creator  and  grasps  something  of  the  eternal  laws 
that  underlie  the  universe.  The  life  is  broadened  and  its 
current  deepened.  It  is  the  dream-time  of  life  and  great  am- 
bitions, noble  purposes  surge  in  upon  the  unfolding  life,  giv- 
ing the  impulses  and  the  ideals  which  decide  the  worthiness 
of  all  after  accomplishment. 

You  are  responsible  for  those  ideals  to  yourself  and  your 
race.  They,  with  the  strong  belief  in  something  better,  purer, 
higher,  form  the  most  precious  heritage  which  may  be  presen/- 
ed  to  a  man  from  his  youth.  Neither  ideals  nor 
belief  come  easily  in  later  years.  Life's  struggles  and 
disappointments  dull  the  sensibilities  and  chill  the  ardor. 
It  is  easy  to  lose  sight  of  these  youthful  ideals  in  the  hardening 
competition  of  maturer  life.  Few  appear  to  share  them  and 
many  scorn  them. 

But  the  world  needs  them.  Whence  will  the  uplift  come 
without  them.  The  ideals  of  many  men  would  seem  to  be  very 
low  and  unworthy,  and  so  too  the  ideals  and  standards  of  bodies 
of  men,  corporations  or  communities  are  apt  to  be  lower  than 
those  of  the  average  member  of  such  a  corporation.  But  the 
influence  of  one  man  can  be  shown  in  no  other  way  so  clearly 
as  when  by  the  mere  force  and  shaming  of  his  own  high  ideal? 
he  raises  all  around  him  to  a  higher  level  and  a  clearer  air. 

I  do  not  claim  that  all  ideals  of  college  days  are  high  or  that 
all  college  men  come  under  the  influence  of  these  higher  stand- 
ards and  make  them  their  own.  I  fear  that  those  who  preserve 
them  untarnished  through  after  life  are  very  few  indeed.  As 
well  might  it  be  maintained  that  college  training  produced  only 
the  wise  and  scholarly.  The  opportunity  for  scholarship  is 
there  though  all  may  not  avail  themselves  of  it.  The  higher 
ideals  tempt  to  excellence  but  many  do  not  yield  themselves 
to  the  temptation.  To  derive  benefit  from  good  things  some- 
thing more  is  necessary-  than  merely  to  be  brought  into  contact 
with  them.    One  must  absorb  Ihem  and  make  them  his  own. 

President  Hadley  put  his  thought  clearly  in  a  recent  ad- 
dress. "The  idea,"  says  he  "that  a  young  man  will  derive  un- 
told benefit  from  spending  four  years'  in  casual  study  of  the 
things  that  suit  him.  even  under  good  masters,  is  as  fallacious 
as  the  idea  that  he  would  derive  such  benefits  from  four  casual 
years  of  travel  in  Europe,  even  among  great  monuments  of  the 


84  University  Bulletin. 

past.  I  well  remember  Professor  Northrop's  characterization 
of  one  of  these  devotees  of  general  culture.  'Mr.  Blank  is  a 
butterfly.  He  chooses  the  prettiest  flowers  in  the  whole  field 
and  flits  from  one  to  another.  The  flowers  are  beautiful  and  so 
is  the  butterfly;  but  when  he  is  through  no  one  knows  which 
flower  he  has  touched  or  where  he  has  gone.'  " 

A  college  education  is  a  most  complex  thing.  Books  are  not 
all  of  it  nor  is  so-called  mental  discipline  its  chief  aim.  The 
sunshine  of  example,  the  gracious  air  of  association,  the  dew 
of  wisdom,  distilled  from  the  master  minds  of  the  world,  all 
play  their  part  in  that  unfolding  of  the  life  and  expansion  of  the 
powers  which  we  call  education.  These  and  other  potent  fac- 
tors work  together  to  implant  ideals,  strengthen  character  and 
bring  the  feeling  of  responsibility. 

And  s'o  the  college  bred  man  may  lead  but  often  does  not ; 
he  may  be  wise  but  often  is  not.  He  should  see  and  feel  the 
truth  more  clearly  than  his  neighbor  but  often  shirks  his  re- 
sponsibility. I  appeal  to  the  college  man  that  he  grasp  the  great 
opportunities  which  await  him  and  come  to  the  help  of  the  peo- 
ple through  whose  self-sacrifice  and  labors  his  advantages  have 
been  granted  him. 

There  will  be  many  who  v.  ill  cry  with  Pilate.  "What  is 
truth,"  meaning  that  there  is  no  truth  over  which  we  need 
greatly  inconvenience  ourselves  nor  sacrifice  our  ease  and 
perhaps  other  of  life's  good  things.  Why  take  trouble  to  search 
out  what  we  style  the  truth  of  things  or  to  correct  what  we 
fancy  are  abuses.  The  world  is  doing  well  and  growing 
better  and  all  things  will  work  out  without  us.  Let  us  take 
things  as  they  come  and  get  the  most  out  of  life  for  ourselves. 

My  friends,  we  men  of  the  schools  were  not  taught  at  the 
expense  of  the  state  or  the  church  or  private  philanthropy  in 
order  that  we  might  have  a  better  chance  in  life  than  some 
one  else,  or  get  ahead  of  others,  or  get  the  most  out  of  life, 
or  for  any  other  selfish  reason.  Can  you  for  a  moment  believe 
that  the  marvellous  outpouring  of  money  for  education  by 
committees  and  by  individuals,  which  we  see  at  present,  has  any 
such  meaning  or  object.  If  I  believed  it  so,  then  I  could  only 
pray  that  these  springs  might  dry  up  for  the  result  would  be 
an  unmixed  evil. 

You  have  been  educated  not  to  get  the  most  possible  out  of 
life  but  to  put  the  most  possible  into  it.     The  supreme  object 


University  Bulletin.  85 

of  your  education  is  to  learn  come  truth  and  faithfully  hoar 
witness  to  it  by  speech  and  life.  The  truth  may  be  great  or 
small,  all  truth  is  of  import.  It  may  bear  on  man's  relation 
to  the  natural  world  around  him,  to  his  fellow  men  or  to  his 
maker.  Whatever  it  may  be  it  leads  upward  and  should  be  no 
man's  secret,  nor  personal  asset  but  the  property  of  the  race. 

I  fear  this  day  of  our  great  and  unexampled  prosperity.  Tho 
test  upon  the  character  of  my  people  is  far  greater  than  those 
days  of  warfare,  of  misrule  and  of  biting  poverty.  There  is 
need  for  sane  counsel  and  wise  leadership  as  never  before. 

There  is  great  power  in  wealth.  There  is  much  pleasure  !n 
the  comforts,  the  luxuries,  the  many  good  things  of  life  which 
it  can  command.  I  do  not  decry  these  things  but  I  ask  that 
a  just  balance  be  drawn  and  due  proportion  of  things'  observed. 
Tliere  is  a  grave  danger  when  men  are  measured  by  their 
wealth  and  a  nation  begins  to  count  it  as  its  greatest  blessing 
or  its  proudest  possession. 

One  who  has  filled  many  positions  of  high  honor,  and  served 
his  country  well — President  Daniel  C.  Oilman — in  speaking  to 
the  sons  of  Princeton  summed  up  as  follows  the  blessings 
granted  to  our  nation. 

"Be  it  forever  remembered  that  we  are  the  heirs  of  great 
possessions  that  we  may  not  keep  to  ourselves.  This  is  an  in- 
ventory of  our  rich  inheritance : 

1.  The  good  tidings  of  Christianity,  destined  to  pervade 
the  earth  with  its  pure  and  simple  morality. 

2.  Civil  and  ecclesiastical  liberty,  secured  by  many  contests, 
from  Magna  Charta  down. 

3.  International  law,  propounded  by  great  jurists  and  ac- 
cepted by  great  states. 

4.  Freedom  of  commercial  intercourse  by  which  the  pro- 
ducts of  nature  and  of  industry  are  exchanged  for  the  mutual 
benefit  of  the  producers,  with  the  least  restriction  possible. 

5.  The  purity  and  happiness  of  domestic  life,  an  idea  almost 
unknown  to  savage  and  half-civilized  men. 

6.  The  value  of  general  education,  with  a  growing  appre 
ciation  of  history  and  literature. 

7.  An  increasing  and  beneficent  iiarvest  of  scientific  inves- 
tigations, by  which  happiness  is  promoted,  life  prolonged,  pain 
destroyed  and  time  and  space  are  overcome." 


86  University  Bulletin. 

Great  possessions,  he  says,  that  we  may  not  keep  to  our- 
selves. In  all  of  this  there  is  no  word  of  our  mines  and  forests', 
our  bursting  granaries,  our  mills  and  factories,  our  vaults 
stored  with  metal,  our  vast  cities  with  their  towering  hives'  of 
human  workers.     Of  such  vain  things  do  the  heathen  boast. 

But  the  warfare  of  the  centuries  has  been  waged  over  those 
other  glorious  possessions.  They  are  hallowed  by  the  death 
of  martyrs,  bought  with  the  blood  of  our  fathers  and  must  be 
transmitted  to  our  children  as  things  which  money  has  not 
bought  and  cannot  buy.  CouiU  them  over  once  more ;  Chris- 
tianity, civil  and  religious  freedom,  justice  for  individuals  and 
nations,  freedom  of  commerce,  protection  of  the  home,  general 
education,  freedom  to  wrest  from  nature  her  priceless  secrets 
for  the  use  of  all. 

I  am  afraid  that  there  is  great  lack  of  appreciation  of  these 
fundamental  rights  of  our  manhood  at  their  true  value  and  that 
sometimes  we  are  readily  cheated  out  of  our  inheritance,  a 
mess'  of  pottage  for  a  glorious  birthright.  Strong  and  true 
men  are  needed  to  work  out  these  great  ideas  to  fuller  and 
fuller  perfection  in  our  national  as  well  as  individual  life- 
Men  who  are  trained  to  see  these  truths  are  responsible  for 
them  to  their  brethren.  If  we  recognized  this  responsibility 
then  that  misleading,  iniquitous  word,  "the  masses"  would  drop 
out  of  our  vocabularies.  There  should  be  no  masses  in  a  de- 
mocracy, masses  to  be  scornfully  overridden,  masses  to  be 
neglected,  masses  to  be  defrauded  of  their  birth-rights.  All 
are  parts'  of  the  state,  all  are  essential,  all  are  inheritors  of  the 
great  rights.  And  if  the  so-called  masses  are  neglected,  left  to 
their  ignorance,  their  vice  or  their  shiftlessness,  the  whole 
state  sufifers  and  our  responsibility  is  pressed  home  to  us 
whether  we  would  acknowledge  it  or  not. 

The  failures  in  our  civilization  are  glaring  enough  for  every 
thinking  man  to  see,  still  it  may  not  be  amiss  for  me  briefly 
to  point  out  some  lines  of  research  for  the  truth-seeker,  great 
problems  which  must  be  solved  if,  as  a  people,  we  would  avoid 
shipwreck  and  to  which  we  cannot  safely  apply  the  doctrine  of 
laissez-faire. 

First  need  I  point  out  our  failures  to  carry  out  the  great 
principles  laid  down  by  the  founder  of  Christianity — the  church's 
miistakes,  divisions,  jealousies  and  fearful  persecutions  are 
matters  of  history.     The  neglect  of  great  and  manifest  duties, 


University  Bulletin.  87 

the  tithing  of  mint  and  anise  and  cunnnin  and  omission  of  the 
weightier  matters  of  the  law  have  led  to  a  loss  of  hold  upon 
the  laboring  classes  and  upon  a  great  many  thinking  men 
and   women. 

Even  the  birthday  of  the  great  healer  of  the  world's  wounds, 
haileci  by  the  angels  as  the  dawn  of  peace  and  good  will  for 
mankind,  is  turned  into  a  season  of  dissipation  and  license 
with  little  lo  remind  one  of  its  glorious  meaning.  A  recent 
writer,  with  a  gleam  of  hope  in  his  heart,  writes  of  Christmas  as 
an  "unfinished  business,"  and  we  too  must  hope  that  there 
is  a  growth  tov/ard  and  a  promise  to  better  things,  for  the  prom- 
ise of  Christianity  is  the  hope  of  the  world.  Is  there  not  truth 
in  the  recent  arraignment  of  Prime  Minister  Balfour,  who  de- 
clares that  the  church  to-day  busies  itself  with  questions  wliich 
do  not  weigh  even  as  dust  in  the  balance  compared  with  the 
vital  ]M-oblems  with  which  it  is  called  upon  to  deal.  The  times 
call  for  true  men  to  seek  out  and  correct  the  errors,  to  save 
from  waste  of  energy,  to  speak  fearlessly  where  truth  is  at 
stake  and  to  l.asten  the  day  when  the  principles  of  Christianity 
shall  be  seen  exemplified  in  the  lives  of  all  the  people. 

Again  the  growing  complications  and  conflicts  between  la- 
bor anrl  capital,  employer  and  employees,  corporations  and  in- 
dividuals, t'ciLts  and  the  people,  with  much  of  truth  and  wrong 
and  injustice  on  both  sides,  demand  wise  and  patient  unra\el- 
ling  and  he  who  has  to  deal  with  such  matters  should  feel  deejjly 
his  responsibility  not  to  this  class  or  to  that  but  to  the  truth. 

Greed  must  not  be  allowed  to  go  unchecked.  No  nation  or 
people  that  coins  the  happiness  and  life-blood  of  littK;  children 
into  dollars  and  cents  can  b.ope  to  p'rosper.  A  comj^etition  f-o 
fiercr  that  machines  are  worked  to  the  limit  and  flesh  and  blood 
strained  to  the  utmost  and  that  causes  the  weak  or  old  or  sickly 
to  be  cast  aside  as  worthy  only  to  perish  can  bring  no  trui^ 
pro'it  to  any  nation.  Men  are  not  to  be  treated  as  machines 
incapable  of  joy  or  sufifering,  without  hope  and  without  souls. 
Labor  is  not  the  sole  end  of  life.  Here  are  great  problems  that 
demand  all  of  our  wisdom  and  call  for  strong  true  men. 

The  education  of  all  the  people  is  a  modern  idea  and  one  that 
has  seen  its  chief  development  in  the  United  States.  The  prin- 
ciple is  right  and  is  fundamentally  essential  to  the  success  of 
any  democracy,  which  promises  equality  of  opportunity 
and  which  would  save  itself  from  the  domination  of 
ambition,    greed     or     false     ideals.     To  these     ends    a     vast 


88  University  Bulletin. 

army  of  teachers  is  employed  and  fabulous  sums  are 
spent  in  equipment  and  for  support.  There  is  call  here 
for  wisdom  and  truth  speaking  (especially  so  in  our 
Southern  land)  lest  false  ideals  creep  in  and  time  and  energy 
as  well  as  money  be  wasted.  And  the  gospel  of  sound  learn- 
ing and  of  education  for  service  must  be  preached. 

It  is  necessary  to  speak  of  but  one  other  problem,  the  gravest 
problem  of  all — our  race  question — the  severest  test  which  was 
ever  laid  upon  a  nation.  I  hesitate  to  speak  of  it  because  I 
look  upon  it  as  almost  beyond  human  wisdom  and  only  to  be 
left  to  the  solution  of  time.  Never  in  the  history  of  the  world 
have  two  peoples  with  ineradicable  race  differences  and  pre- 
judices between  them,  numbering  millions  of  individuals,  free, 
with  equal  privileges  of  suffrage,  education,  religion  and  civil 
liberty,  and  opportunity,  been  set  upon  the  same  soil  to  develop 
side  by  side.  God  alone  knows  the  solution  or  the  end  of  it. 
But  truth-loving  and  truth-speaking  men  must  see  to  it  that 
the  weaker  race  is  treated  justly  and  with  a  broad  and  wise 
charity. 

And  so  the  call  to  the  college  man  is  one  of  service — to  be  a 
leader — to  lead  his  people  into  the  truth  in  order  that  they 
may  be  free — to  fit  them  for  a  liberty  which  is  not  license  and 
a  freedom  which  begets  no^  wrong. 

Men  speak  of  political  freedom  and  patriots  have  struggled 
and  died  to  free  their  country,  but  this  kind  of  freedom  means 
only  a  change  of  yokes  and  masters.  For  man  must  be  gov- 
erned in  some  way  to  insure  the  public  good.  A  constitution  is 
substituted  for  autocracy ;  a  many  headed  majority  for  one 
king,  a  ruler  chosen  by  the  people  for  one  foisted  upon  tliem 
through  some  fancied  right  or  by  sheer  might.  But  he  who 
teaches  the  truth  brings  into  the  world  the  only  breath  of  free- 
dom which  it  knows,  releasing  those  who  find  wisdom  from 
tyrannies  more  enslaving  and  degrading  than  any  mere  politi- 
cal tyranny. 

Teach  the  truth  and  the  slavery  of  ignorance  disappears,  the 
bondage  of  superstition  and  of  error  is  broken,  the  selfishness 
and  narrowness  of  petty  ecclesiasticism  and  bigotry  are  done 
away.  All  of  these,  together  with  all  that  degrades,  or  dwarfs, 
or  poisons  in  any  way,  the  sweet  waters  of  the  fountain  of  hu- 
man liberty  shall  vanish  away  i)s  the  noisome  mists  are  dispelled 
by  the  rising  of  the  glorious  sun. 


HONORARY  DEGREES. 

For  eminent  and  conspicuous  services  rendered  to  society 
and  the  state  in  their  respective  spheres  of  achievement,  the 
University  through  its  President  and  Board  of  Trustees,  con- 
ferred the  honorary  degree  of  Doctor  of  Laws  upon  each  of 
the  following  citizens  of  the  United  States : 

Brown  Ayres,  President  of  the  University  of  Tennessee. 

James  Curtis  Ballagh,  Associate  Professor  of  American  His- 
tory, John  Hopkins  University. 

Thomas  Greene  Bush,  Capitalist,  Birmingham,  Ala. 

W-infield  Scott  Chaplin,  Chancellor  of  Washington  Uni- 
versity. 

Francis  Horton  Colcock,  Professor  of  Mathematics.  Uni- 
versity of  South  Carolina. 

Thomas  Wilkes  Coleman,  Lawyer,  Eutaw,  Ala. 

Erwin  Craighead,  Editor  of  the  Mobile  Register,  Mobile, 
Ala. 

John  LaFayette  Dodson,  Educator,  Oxford,  Ala. 

Robert  Burwell  Fulton,  Chancellor  of  the  University  of 
Mississippi. 

George  Rainsford  Fairbanks,  Fernandina,  Fla. 

William  Herbert  Perry  Faunce,  President  of  Brown  Univer- 
sity. 

James  Harris  Fitts,  Banker,  Tuscaloosa,  Ala. 

Reuben  Reid  Gaines,  Chief  Justice  of  the  Supreme  Court, 
Austin,  Tex. 

Hilary  Abncr  Herbert,  Lawyer,  Washington,  D,  C. 

Isaac  William  Hill,  State  Superintendent  of  Education, 
Montgomery,  Ala. 

Robert  Jemison,  Capitalist,  Birmingham,  Ala. 

George  Doherty  Johnston,  Tuscaloosa,  Ala. 

Charles  William  Kent,  Professor  of  English,  University  of 
Virginia. 

George  Little,  Educator,  Tuscaloosa,  Ala. 

Thomas  Chalmers  McCorvey,  Professor  of  Plistory  and  Po- 
litical Economy,  University  of  Alabama. 

Frank  Sims  Moody,  Banker,  Tuscaloosa,  Ala. 

John  Tyler  Morgan,  United  States  Senator,  Selma,  Ala. 


90  Univursity  Bulletin. 

James  Thomas  Murfee,  Superintendent  Marion  Military  In- 
stitute, Marion,  Ala. 

Thomas  Walker  Page,  Professor  of  Economics,  University 
of  California. 

Thomas  Waverly  Palmer,  Professor  of  Mathematics,  Univer- 
sity of  Alabama. 

Josiah  Harmar  Penniman,  Professor  of  English  Literature 
and  Dean  of  the  Academic  Dept.,  University  of  Pennsylvania. 

Francis  Marion  Peterson,  President  of  the  Girls'  Industrial 
School,  Montevallo,  Alabama. 

Edmund  Winston  Pettus,  United  States  Senator,  Selma,  Ala. 

John  Herbert  Phillips,  Superintendent  of  Schools,  Birming- 
ham, Ala. 

John  Andrew  Rice,  Pastor  Court  Street  Methodist  Church, 
Montgomery,  Ala. 

Warfield  Creath  Richardson,  Educator,  Tuscaloosa,  Ala. 

Rufus  Napoleon  Rhodes,  Editor  of  the  Birmingham  Nezvs, 
Birmingham,  Ala. 

William  Wallace  Screws,  Editor  of  the  Advertiser,  Mont- 
gomery, Ala. 

James  Thomas  Searcy,  Superintendent  of  the  Alabama  Br}xe 
Hospital  for  the  Insane,  Tuscaloosa,  Ala. 

Eugene  Allen  Smith,  Professor  of  Geology  and  Mineralogy, 
University  of  Alabama. 

Ellison  Adger  Smyth,  Jr.,  Professor  of  Biology  and  Dean 
Virginia  Polytechnic  Institute 

James  George  Snedecor,  Secretary  of  the  Committee  of  Col- 
ored Evangelization  of  the  Southern  Presbyterian  Church,  Tus- 
caloosa, Ala. 

Charles  Arnette  Towne,  Member  of  Congress  from  the  Four- 
teenth District,  New  York  City. 

William  Sewell  Thorington,  Professor  of  Law  and  Dean  of 
the  Law  School,  University  of  Alabama. 

Julia  Strudwick  Tutwiler,  President  of  State  Normal  School, 
Livingston,  Ala. 

Francis  Preston  Venable,  President  of  the  University  of 
North  Carolina. 

James  Edward  Webb,  Attorney  at  Law,  Birmingham,  Ala. 

Morton  Bryan  Wharton,  Pastor  Baptist  Church,  Eufaula, 
Ala. 

Benjamin  Leon  Wyman,  Dean  of  the  Birmingham  Medical 
College,  Birmingham,  Ala. 


DEGREES  IN  COURSE. 
Masters  of  Arts. 

Pearl  Boyles,  A.  B.,  1905, Crichton 

Thesis :        Wliittier. 

Eleanor  Packer  McCorv^ey,  A.  B.,  1904,-- University 

Thesis :     The  Poetry  of  Sidney  Lanier. 

Mary  Camilla  Parker,  A.  B.,  1905, Tuscaloosa 

Thesis  :     William  Cullen  Bryant. 

Mary  Cowper  Pittman,  A.  B.,  1905, Union  Springs 

Thesis:     Is  Walt  Whitman  a  Poet? 

Masters  of  Science. 

Ruby  Swann  Lawhon,  B.  S.,  1905, Livingston 

Thesis:     The  Evolution  of  Chemistry. 

James  Rice,  B.  S.,  1905, Northport 

Thesis:    The  Status  of  the  Coal  Industry  in  Alabama  To-day. 

Civil  Engineers. 

Huriesco  Austill,  Jr., Mobile 

Thesis:     A  Virtual  Profile  Study  of  a  Section  of  M.  &  W.  A. 
R.  R. 

Preston  Alfred  Craighead,  Jr., Uniontown 

B.  S.  in  Engineering,   1904. 
Thesis :    Design  for  a  Concrete-Steel  Arch,  Luten's  Method. 

Truman  Aldrich  Smith,  B.  S.  in  Engineering,  I905--University 
Thesis:     Through  Plate  Girder  Bridge  over  Branch  of  Sipsey 
River. 

George  Woolscy  Vanhoosc,  Jr., Tuscaloosa 

Thesis :    Design  for  a  100-foot  Span  Concrete-Steel  Arch,  Elas- 
tic Theory. 

Mining  Engineer. 

Thomas  Baird  Catchings, Birmingham 

Thesis:     "Room  and  Pillar"  and  "Longwall"  Systems  of  Work- 
ing Coal  in  Alabama. 


92  University  Bulletin. 

Bachelor  of  Arts. 

Ira  Bradfield Tuscaloosa 

William  Cicero  Braswell Elba 

Jelks  Henry  Cabaniss Birmingham 

Mary  Hale  Cockrell Livingston 

William  Roger  Cunningham Union  Springs 

Archie  Hendricks  Darden Rockford 

William  Creach  Dozier Thomasville 

Milton  Victor  Hanaw Mobile 

Charles  Otis  Hayslette Tuscaloosa 

Sam  Lee  Jones Camden 

James  Mallory  Kidd Harpersville 

Lillian  Matheson  Lotspeich Mobile 

Oscar  Paleman  McGraw Vincent 

John  William  McLeod Mobile 

Albert  Edward  Mayer Demopolis 

Myrtle  Merrill Anniston 

Washington  Moody Tuscaloosa 

James  Edward  Morrisette Newbern 

Lelia  Kate  Poynor Mt.  Hebron 

Alex  Bismarck  Ray Jasper 

Alvin  Erdreich  Siegel Selma 

Robert  Eugene  Steiner,  Jr. Montgomery 

Bertha  Young Montgomery 

Bachelors  of  Science. 

Mary  Camilla  Armistead Scotia 

Edward  Kirby  Chambers Eutaw 

Jesse  Pugh  Chapman Jackson 

Leiland  Woodard  Chapman Jackson 

Helen  Holmes  Hopkins Anniston 

Georgia  Etta  Howard Albertviile 

Jesse  Lee  Jones Barachia? 

Minnie  Knox  Kenan Geneva 

Roy  Harrison  Ledbetter Anniston 

Samuel  Labon  Ledbetter Birmingham 

Anna  Jane  Moody Tuscaloos.i 

WilHam  S.  Mudd Birmingham. 

Laurebelle  Martha  Pickett Hector 


University  Bulletin.  93 

Wade  Allen  Rogers Letohatchic 

lone  Snedecor Tuscaloosa 

Evelyn  Somerville Aliceville 

Harry  Atchison  Wyatt New  Decatur 

Bachelors  of  Science  in  Engineering. 

Thomas  Baird  Catchings Birmingham 

Herbert  Ivey  Collins Gallion 

Herbert  Otis  Gosa Knoxville 

Walter  Baker  Harris Tuscaloosa 

Bachelors  of  Laws. 

Hezzie  Hayes  Black Birmingham 

Hugo  LaFayette  Black Ashland 

Bartlett  Beardslee  Chamberlain Mobile 

John  Dantzler  Chappelle Marion 

Edgar  LaRoche  Clarkson Tuscaloosa 

Am  Wilson  Cooper Dothan 

George  Jordan  Costen,  Jr. Sunberry.  N.  C. 

Allen  Crenshaw Hope  Hull 

Marvin  Alexander  Dinsmore Falkville 

James  Browder  Garber Demopolis 

James  Daniel  Giles Perryvillc 

Walton  Harris  Hill Montgomery 

Joseph  Hopkins  James,  Jr. Wetumpka 

William  Murray  Jones Bear 

William  Rhett  Kimbrough LindcTi 

Thomas  Arthur  McDaniel Gadsden 

Wallace  Powell  Pruitt Fort  Deposit 

Roscoe  Elmore  Scott Ensley 

Victor  Herring  Smith Pell  City 

Henry  Addison  Teel Hanover 

Pascal  Bryce  Traweek Humphrey 

Joseph  Mitchell  Tucker Montgomery 

Thomas  Benjamin  Ward Greensboro 

Doctors  of  Medicine. 

James  David  Atkins Alabama 

William  Clifford  Bailey Alabama 


94  University  Bulletin. 

William  Stillman  Bell Alabama 

Benson  Walker  Booth Alabama 

William  Lyles  Box Alabama 

Frederick  William  Boyd Alabama 

Ellie  George  Burson Alabama 

Manly  LaFayette  Cummins Alaban:a 

John  Jonathan  Dailey Alabaina 

Walter  Lee  Dodson Alabama 

Clarence  Edward  Farish Alabama 

Thomas  Hamilton  Gailiard Alabama 

Daniel  Luther  Harper Mississippi 

Perrin  Pou  Johnson Mississippi 

Walter  B.  Lanford Alabama 

Towfik  Lutaif Syria 

Leon   Henry  Mayo Alabama 

William  Allen  Mason Alabama 

Roscoe  Lee  Meharg- Alabama 

James  Andrew  McDevitt Mississippi 

James  Patrick  McMurphy Alabama 

John  Calhoun  Parham Alabama 

Thomas  Jefferson  Patton,  Jr. Alabama 

David  Phillip  Pruitt Alabama 

James  Henry  Somerville,  Jr. Alabama 

James  Tankersley Alabama 

John  Samuel  Tucker Alabama 

Cullen  Brv-ant  Wilson Florida 

Samuel  LaFayette  Woolley Alabama 

Graduates  in  Pharmacy. 

Albert  Brown  Byers Alabama 

Thomas  Edmund  Dennis Alabama 

John  Augustus  Gibbs Alabama 

Edwin  Oscar  Harper Mississippi 

William  Clarke  Jones Alabaitia 

George  Wesley  Newbern Alaban-'a 

James  Monroe  Northcutt Alabama 

Abner  Earle  Patton Alabama 

Laula  Asberry  Pope Alabama 

William  Franklin  Wilson Alabama 


HIGHEST  HONORS  FOR  EXCELLENCE  IN 
SCHOLARSHIP. 

In  the  Academic  Department. 

SENIORS. 

Mary  Camilla  Armistead. 
Jelks  Henry  Cabaniss. 
Herbert  Otis  Gosa. 
Lillian  Matheson  Lotspeich. 
James  Edward  Morrisette. 
Laurebelle  Martha  Pickett. 

JUNIORS. 

Zula  Lee. 

Bessie  Hall  Merrill. 

Thomas  Herbert  Patton. 

SOPHOMORES. 
Jerome  Meyer. 
Balpha  Lonnie  Noojin. 
Helen  Judith  Vickers. 

IN  THE  LAW  DEPARTMENT. 

Hugo  LaFayette  Black. 
James  Browder  Garber,  Jr. 
Joseph  Hopkins  James,  Jr. 
Roscoe  Elmore  Scott. 
Victor  Herring-  Smith. 
Henry  Addis'on  Teel. 
Thomas  Benjamin  Ward. 

IN  THE  MEDICAL  DEPARTMENT. 

Clarence  Edward  Farish. 
Daniel  Luther  Harper. 
Roscoe  Lee  Meharg. 
John  Calhoun   Parham. 


PRIZES  AWARDED. 

THE  BRYAN    PRIZE). 

Charles  Edgar  Rice. 
Subject:     Governmental  Regulation  of  Inter-State  Carriers. 

THE  C.  E.  THOMAS  MEDAL. 

Paul  Bartholdi  Jones. 
Subject:     The  Ultimate  Triumph  of  Liberty. 

THE  TENNANT  LOMAX  PRIZE. 

David  Ingram  Purser,  Jr. 
Subject:     Night  Brings  Out  the  Stars. 

THE  J.   C.   BUSH  PRIZE. 

John  Calhoun  Parham. 

trustees'  prize. 

James  Mallory  Kidd. 

Subject:     Our  Imperial  Colonial  Policy. 


UNIVERSITY  OF  CALIFORNIA  LIBRARY 

Los  Angeles 
This  book  is  DUE  on  the  last  date  stamped  below. 


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